Or, How to accommodate a scaredy-cat
This article is the second chapter reflecting on how an anxious cat began to adjust to a new situation. Tesoro appears to be like any other house cat. The appetite is strong, especially for Gerber Foods turkey. Ten-hour naps twice daily are the norm. The hooman is a source of curiosity. Of course, anything brought into the house is for him. One evening, I arrived home with a dirty sweaty saddle pad intended for the washing machine. Didn’t he rub his little self all over the thing and have a look of glee on his face? There’s a wild cat inside of him after all.
He is highly self-involved, but as the animal communicator said, the days can be too long. When he was adopted, I asked if he had a companion that could come along as well. No, his friends had already gone. The experts say, find a way to play with the cat to build a rapport. Tesoro would not chase a string or move at all when confronted with wriggling feathery toys. The closest we came to peaceful interactions came in the early evening when he liked to sit at the top of the staircase and observe. Bounce a ball his way? We started a ritual with me standing at the bottom of the stairwell, tossing soft bouncy colorful balls up near his perch. He watched carefully as they bounced down and were caught by the hooman. I thought he might give chase. He does like to tackle a spring coil spiral toy that flies across a wood floor with ease.
In January 2018, about one year later, a new kitty was brought into the home. The notion he needed to see a normally socialized cat in action took over. Plus, what’s wrong with a playmate? Stellina, aka “Stella” came home on a day when the outdoor temperature was 4 ° F at midday. Despite her age of two she meows with the voice of a kitten. She came from a home with too many cats. Apparently, she liked to play and pester the older housecats. Grey cats, the pagan in me remembers some comment about having a grey cat in the home. They have a special magic all their own and are wise. Stellina means little star in Italian. Just look at her. What other name could she have!
Her dainty size tells me she might have been the runt of the litter. The dinky tail doesn’t really match her stout body and small head. The first month or so was bumpy between the two. Tesoro wasn’t exactly hospitable. My tiny cottage has only a few doors so separation isn’t all that easy to accomplish. At night, I confined Stella in my bedroom to give them space to chill out. Maybe it was the third month when living with each other normalized. As I had hoped, Stella enjoyed sitting on my lap and being petted. Tesoro would watch us from his favorite chair. She sleeps on my bed each night. We play chase the string often. A bounced ball is something to run after! Tesoro observed in his sedate manner.
One Saturday in April, Stella stepped out into the back yard. The walkout basement door includes a pet flap. Ever the curious, rather bold little kitty, I let her come out with me as I tended the yard. She ran underneath the nearby shed and stayed there about an hour. Okay, so being outdoors was a new experience. Kitty treats coaxed her out so I could bring her back inside. It was a little chilly after all, but her first adventure.
There’s a notion I foster that cats need to behave like cats for their whole health. As gruesome as it is, chasing prey is natural as is eating grass, climbing trees and wandering around. Elvis, the orange tabby cat who lives two houses away, routinely sits around the back yard. He was down near the big maple trees the very day I moved in ten years ago. It’s part of his loop. The conditions are good in our big yard for a cat being outside. At the end of the yard are the railroad tracks. A big field with huge rock maple trees marks the property line on one side and a young forest on the other. There’s a house in their somewhere with don’t bother me kind of neighbors. So, on mild days going forward, Stella joined me outside. At night, she is expected to be indoors. Mostly, she is waiting first in line for dinner so coaxing her indoors is not a problem. Occasionally, she has a lapse into total cat hunting mode and resists coming indoors.
The two eventually accepted one another. Tesoro has come to love Stella. She accepts him but has a hissy fit when things get too close. She is definitely the alpha. Tesoro’s fear of the basement stopped him from following her outdoors. He would stand at the top and yowl down for her. I used to say, go on big guy, go on down and find out where she goes. On sunny days, the front storm door is propped open to allow the air to flow through the house. Tesoro would wander onto the steps and enjoy sitting outside. Sometimes, he would poke around the grass but never strayed far. Stella would roam in past him through the front door and go on out the back door. Sometimes, he watched her in the yard from the window perch. He wanted to go too but his inner cat said no.
On a Sunday last fall, I started winding up the garden chores for the day. The Amtrak went by signaling it was late afternoon already. Walking up towards the house, I saw Tesoro slinking down towards the back yard! He was looking at everything, found the open basement door, and dashed in. WOW! He sniffed around and ran up the dreaded stairs! The boogeyman was no more. Once he went up, he understood it’s okay to go down. In fact, he started sleeping on the pile of dirty laundry overnight.
Stella is our queen. By being herself, she opened Tesoro up to ideas he never would have considered. He does join us in playtime now. Stella showed him how to tackle a wriggling string and tell it who is boss. It worked, my idea of Tesoro being a semi-feral cat not socialized to the norms of living with the hooman and needing to see healthy interactions worked out.
LuceStellare 