Sweet Little Kitty - Day 116 - Daily Haiku

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Sweet little kitty
I'm missing you already
thanks for visiting

Cori MacNaughton

Those who have been following me know that, for the past several weeks, I've been trying to sweet talk an injured cat that showed up on my place into becoming our barn kitty.

After feeding it for a few weeks, and providing it with a large cat/dog carrier, as makeshift shelter on the front covered porch of our studio, I was debating whether it would would find it if I moved it into our barn, when I surprised it sleeping in the straw outside our goats' stall on one rainy day. After we stared at one another for a good long moment, as I spoke to it softly to let it know that it was welcome and safe in our barn, it ultimately limped off to hide under our barn until I vacated the premises.

That was on 26 April, my grandmother Ouida's birthday. As we engaged in our staring contest, I got a good look at its' left rear flank, which looked like an attacker had taken a good-sized chunk out of the muscle of its hip. Although the fur had grown back, there was a distinct round depression in the flesh, and it moved with a profound limp that made me think it was still painful. I also thought of sepsis, and was even more determined to get it to a vet, as soon as possible.

I moved the cat carrier, food and water into the barn that afternoon, in full view of its hiding place where it had disappeared under the barn, but the food remained untouched for a couple of days. But then, just about the time I was going to move it back to the studio, one afternoon I arrived to take the goats in, and discovered that the food had been eaten. And from that point forward, every time I left food, it was gone by the time I returned.

Only once did I doubt that it was the white and black cat eating the food, and that was when I arrived to find that the food and water bowls had both been knocked off the carrier, and I immediately got the impression of an opossum or a raccoon. But every other time, everything was as I had left it, with the exception of the food being eaten.

But although it left periodic evidence of its presence, and I had the strong feeling that it was the cat eating the food, the day I surprised it sleeping in the straw is the last time I actually spotted it.

Several days ago, when I went to feed the goats before shutting them in their stall for the night, the faint smell of decaying flesh hit me as soon as I opened the door to the tack room. I immediately thought of the little cat, but convinced myself that that wasn't the case, and continued to feed it. And, every morning, the food was gone.

The next day, the smell got progressively worse, but then on the third day it seemed to have dissipated somewhat, so I was able to convince myself that maybe a rat or squirrel had crawled under the barn and died, but certainly nothing as large as a cat, or the smell would not have dissipated so quickly.

But that afternoon, when I came to check on the goats, I surprised a young opossum atop the cat carrier, where it had been eating the cat food. It stared at me as well, but I moved off to deal with the goats and did not approach it again, whereupon it made its escape.

By morning, the food remained untouched, which upset me more than I had thought it would. Opossums are typically shy creatures and don't mess with cats unless they are truly desperate. This guy didn't seem too desperate.

Speaking to Marek that night, he asked if I really wanted to know, and I said yes, I want to know either way. I was a biology major, and have always had a pragmatic view toward death, and dead bodies are just another facet of life. They have never freaked me out, including those of family members, which is why I have always been the designee to attend funerals and visit people in the hospital.

So the next day, Marek cut all the poison ivy vines on the north side of the barn, and when I came out from the tack room, he asked how the smell was. When I told him that it had dissipated further, and was quite faint, he said, "Well, you can smell it outside." Damn.

I took the towel from the cat carrier, so I wouldn't be kneeling directly in the poison ivy, and checked under the barn, but using only the flashlight from my phone, it was tough to make out exactly what I was seeing. I snapped the photo above, with its vaguely kitty-shaped mound, but the photo proved it to be simply a mound of soil.

He directed me to move a few feet to the left, next to a large cedar post, which I did. I immediately found strands of white fur just inside and under the walls of the barn, and sure enough, a few feet in, I finally spotted it.

I'll spare you the photo, though Marek couldn't even tell it was a cat, as a few days of decomposition left it looking more like a pile of rags with some loose fur scattered about; but the fangs made it clear that our little white kitty had indeed adopted the barn, and had made it his or her final home. Marek commented that the kitty-shaped mound of soil was a spirit kitty.

Bummer. But, everything happens for a reason. And perhaps the reason this kitty found us was so that, for a brief time at least, it knew that it had a safe place where it would be regularly fed, and loved to the extent that it was able to accept.

Interestingly, last night when Marek and I got home from the store, I was unloading groceries from the back of our car, and distinctly felt a cat rubbing against my legs. Bear was inside, and when I looked up, Musica was on the front porch.

So maybe our little kitty, too afraid in life to allow a kindly touch, found the courage in spirit. Or perhaps it was a visit from one of our beloved cats that we've lost since moving here.

In any case, I initially thought it was Musica, and I've been a cat owner for way too long to think I imagined it. My first instinct on feeling the touch, was to make sure I didn't trip over her, which I've done more than once. ;-)

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Some of my recent posts:

When I Was Shot At - Golden State Killer - Day 115 - Daily Haiku - part 2
Golden State Killer - Day 114 - Daily Haiku - part 1
To Our Mockingbird - Day 113 - Daily Haiku
To Write a Haiku - Day 112 - Daily Haiku - Photography
Cinco de Mayo - Day 111 - Daily Haiku - architecturalphotography
Six Years in This Place - Day 110 - Daily Haiku - Smartphone Photography
Feeling the Essence - Day 109 - Daily Haiku - Smartphone Photography
I Am So Grateful - Day 108 - Daily Haiku - Smartphone Photography
Sitting by the Fire - Day 107 - Daily Haiku - Smartphone Photography
Remember Always - Day 106 - Daily Haiku - Smartphone Photography
Spring Flowers Are Here - Day 105 - Daily Haiku - Landscape Photography on our farm

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The photo of our dog, Lolo, and our late cat, Miod, I took as they were cooperatively begging at the dinner table, despite our longstanding rule of not feeding them from the table.

You can see how much that deterred them both.

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You have a minor grammatical mistake in the following sentence:

As we engaged in our staring contest, I got a good look at its' left rear flank, which looked like an attacker had taken a good-sized chunk our of the muscle of its hip.
It should be out of instead of our of.

Yup, thanks for pointing out the typo. My just desserts for posting, once again, hours after I should have been in bed sleeping. Though it is, in fact a typo, having nothing to do with grammar. ;-)

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