LJI Season 8: Food Memory
I sit in a corner of the long abandoned chicken house, still as a statue. The sight of me must be strange; I wear my mother's heavy jacket over my jeans and light sweater and my five year-old hands are cartoon-ish in my stepfather's thick work gloves.
In my lap is a paper bowl with kibble in it. The feral kittens venture ever closer to it, and, as one starts to eat, I cautiously stroke him with a finger while keeping a hand around him, as well, to stop any escape attempt. Generally, they try at least once to leave once I touch them, but I'm ready. I cup the runner between gloves and make soothing noises to it as it's claws attempt to penetrate the heavy materials protecting me. Kissing the tiny fuzzball on the head, I stroked my cheek against his. Within ten minutes, he is calm and I can set him down and he will not runaway.
Sometimes, it takes just a few hours to complete this process and tame the entire batch of kittens. Other times, it takes days if one of the untamed is extra shy.
It has been a very long time since I encountered a litter of feral kittens, although I frequently meet feral adult felines. You see, we helped rescue a lovely cat from a power pole in an ice storm, and then took her in to save her life. Almost a year later, we found her owners, but they did not want her back. We were a bit disgusted, but relieved because she'd already stolen our hearts. The one problem with her, though, was that she refused- and by "refused," I mean peed everywhere if we wouldn't let her out- she refused to be a indoor only cat. We relented and allowed her access to both.
Not long after she won her freedom battle, she started bringing feral cats we had not previously seen to our house. She'd sit on the porch with them and allow them to eat her food. Since then, there has always been at least one, and never more than three, "friends" of hers eating at what we've dubbed Rosie's Soup Kitchen.
There is one cat that has been coming here for more than three years. He was so extremely shy when he first started arriving that we chose to use another door into the house so that he wouldn't run away as he was prone to doing. We didn't want to name him- naming tended to mean we got attached and then something would happen and it was always so hard to move on- instead we identified him by the pattern of his coat.
By last year, he no longer ran away when we'd come and go on the porch, he'd just move away from the door and watch until we were gone. As a treat, I would sometimes give him gushy food, which he loved. I began talking to him more and more, and he'd let me get a bit closer.
This year, in the spring, he and another visitor started getting wet food each night. The other stray- a very dark tabby- was not feral, just homeless. He would run over to me and start rubbing on my legs and begging to be petted. I would give him lots of love as the other kitty looked on with interest. I started cooing at our shy friend, and he started emulating the other cat and flirting when I did so. He just didn't know where to go from there.
One day, just before summer, the friendly tabby showed up on my porch looking unwell. He was crying and rubbing my leg, and he smelled terrible. When he fell over, I understood. His neck had been torn open, and it looked like it had happened at least a day ago. Our shy soup kitchen kitty watch everything from the bench about six feet from us, and he saw me moved the injured cat to a towel-lined kennel and place him in the car. He did not return with me from the emergency vet.
Within a week, the shy guy disappeared. He did this at times, but when he didn't come back after 3 weeks, I worried we'd never see him again. I thought what he had seen had traumatized him and he associated it with me. Then, right after a huge storm, he found his way back. I was so excited to see him that I got him two cans of wet food to put with the dry we had out, fresh water, and lots of cooing over him.
I started waving to him and talking to him each time he was around. After a few weeks, I was able to scoot close to him in a crouch and put my hand out to him. He began to sniff it, then he started giving me little kisses on my fingers. We stayed in this stage until the last few weeks.
Over the last few weeks, things have been different. It's hard to say what changed with him, but I noticed that my tabby friend would pause around my hand now, so I started touching his nose or the top of his head. He would get really excited when I flirted and cooed, so I began doing that before opening the can for him and he loved it. Brief brushes on his forehead, flank, and tail happened after that, then we seemed to hit a roadblock.
Last week, something upset me a lot, and I was secretly hoping for something else to happen that would raise my spirits. I needed it, I thought, to get out of my funk.
I got my wish! Suddenly, I was able to pet him daily, he comes over when called, and it's like time stops for him when he's getting his ears rubbed.
When it happened, I was taken back to those days when I was naught more than a kindergartener, but I was able to tame cats with food, patience, and love.
Certainly the process is longer and more difficult when both the cat and the tamer are older, but the gift of clean, safe food goes a long way to forge a bond, and, really, could the same not be true of the human beast?
In my lap is a paper bowl with kibble in it. The feral kittens venture ever closer to it, and, as one starts to eat, I cautiously stroke him with a finger while keeping a hand around him, as well, to stop any escape attempt. Generally, they try at least once to leave once I touch them, but I'm ready. I cup the runner between gloves and make soothing noises to it as it's claws attempt to penetrate the heavy materials protecting me. Kissing the tiny fuzzball on the head, I stroked my cheek against his. Within ten minutes, he is calm and I can set him down and he will not runaway.
Sometimes, it takes just a few hours to complete this process and tame the entire batch of kittens. Other times, it takes days if one of the untamed is extra shy.
It has been a very long time since I encountered a litter of feral kittens, although I frequently meet feral adult felines. You see, we helped rescue a lovely cat from a power pole in an ice storm, and then took her in to save her life. Almost a year later, we found her owners, but they did not want her back. We were a bit disgusted, but relieved because she'd already stolen our hearts. The one problem with her, though, was that she refused- and by "refused," I mean peed everywhere if we wouldn't let her out- she refused to be a indoor only cat. We relented and allowed her access to both.
Not long after she won her freedom battle, she started bringing feral cats we had not previously seen to our house. She'd sit on the porch with them and allow them to eat her food. Since then, there has always been at least one, and never more than three, "friends" of hers eating at what we've dubbed Rosie's Soup Kitchen.
There is one cat that has been coming here for more than three years. He was so extremely shy when he first started arriving that we chose to use another door into the house so that he wouldn't run away as he was prone to doing. We didn't want to name him- naming tended to mean we got attached and then something would happen and it was always so hard to move on- instead we identified him by the pattern of his coat.
By last year, he no longer ran away when we'd come and go on the porch, he'd just move away from the door and watch until we were gone. As a treat, I would sometimes give him gushy food, which he loved. I began talking to him more and more, and he'd let me get a bit closer.
This year, in the spring, he and another visitor started getting wet food each night. The other stray- a very dark tabby- was not feral, just homeless. He would run over to me and start rubbing on my legs and begging to be petted. I would give him lots of love as the other kitty looked on with interest. I started cooing at our shy friend, and he started emulating the other cat and flirting when I did so. He just didn't know where to go from there.
One day, just before summer, the friendly tabby showed up on my porch looking unwell. He was crying and rubbing my leg, and he smelled terrible. When he fell over, I understood. His neck had been torn open, and it looked like it had happened at least a day ago. Our shy soup kitchen kitty watch everything from the bench about six feet from us, and he saw me moved the injured cat to a towel-lined kennel and place him in the car. He did not return with me from the emergency vet.
Within a week, the shy guy disappeared. He did this at times, but when he didn't come back after 3 weeks, I worried we'd never see him again. I thought what he had seen had traumatized him and he associated it with me. Then, right after a huge storm, he found his way back. I was so excited to see him that I got him two cans of wet food to put with the dry we had out, fresh water, and lots of cooing over him.
I started waving to him and talking to him each time he was around. After a few weeks, I was able to scoot close to him in a crouch and put my hand out to him. He began to sniff it, then he started giving me little kisses on my fingers. We stayed in this stage until the last few weeks.
Over the last few weeks, things have been different. It's hard to say what changed with him, but I noticed that my tabby friend would pause around my hand now, so I started touching his nose or the top of his head. He would get really excited when I flirted and cooed, so I began doing that before opening the can for him and he loved it. Brief brushes on his forehead, flank, and tail happened after that, then we seemed to hit a roadblock.
Last week, something upset me a lot, and I was secretly hoping for something else to happen that would raise my spirits. I needed it, I thought, to get out of my funk.
I got my wish! Suddenly, I was able to pet him daily, he comes over when called, and it's like time stops for him when he's getting his ears rubbed.
When it happened, I was taken back to those days when I was naught more than a kindergartener, but I was able to tame cats with food, patience, and love.
Certainly the process is longer and more difficult when both the cat and the tamer are older, but the gift of clean, safe food goes a long way to forge a bond, and, really, could the same not be true of the human beast?