Two years with Yellow… one with Luna
Yes, it is true: time flies. September 5, 2015, a stray cat we christened Yellow entered our lives, a story I told another time. One year later, Luna became the second cat in the house. Not bad for someone that did not want to have cats.
Looking at the calendar I realize two years have gone since Yellow became the “house cat”, brought by my older son, Miguel, who found three abandoned kittens on the street, apparently from a group of four from which one was already dead. Two more cats, Black and Little One, died, Black unexpectedly with a family that adopted it, Little One after a fierce battle our vet, we and the cat fought to save her life. Little One represents a turning point on my decision to have animals, something I think I explained in previous articles, from The Day I put Little One to Rest to One Year with Yellow.
Time flies, as I wrote above, and as one gets older time flies, no doubt. Or we start to have less notion of it passing. I felt that recently, while taking a newlywed couple for a photo tour around the area where I live. While visiting a solitary little chapel in the midst of a valley, I told them I had written a story about a pilgrimage of Our Lady of Nazareth, whose statue comes to the valley each 17 years. The image returns to the valley this year, and while telling them the story I said I had written my article 17 years ago. Only some days later I found out my memory had tricked me, as I wrote the story 34 years ago… Yes, the article was published in Diário de Notícias Magazine, a Sunday magazine distributed with the most important daily — at the time — newspaper in Portugal. That was in 1983!
So, somewhere along the line I skipped 17 years. No wonder I sometimes feel that I lost grasp of the flow of time. It may well have something to do with photography, and the way I feel when I photograph, as I tried to share with my readers through articles like The Last Colours of Summer or One Lens, One Hour, My Vision of Autumn. Or my interest in long exposures, as I mention in Ghosts from Last Summer — Exploring Light at High-Noon.
Now that I’ve settled the stage, let’s celebrate two years with Yellow, one with Luna. Luna is not “my cat”, she came with my younger son, João, when he moved back home, something I shared in another story published here, Luna & Yellow: from complete strangers to cat buddies.
This celebration is just another excuse to share with you some images showing how the two cats go around the house. While I write this, little after noon, Luna is sleeping somewhere in João’s bedroom, while Yellow is comfortably lying on the new round cardboard bed we bought, so has to not have the two cats fighting over the rectangular blue box they use as bed, which was one of the best acquisitions we made recently. It’s a scratching board and play area all in one big cardboard box. With a cardboard scratch pad on top, two balls with bells inside, and lots of holes to poke through. See the pictures with the blue box and you’ll get the idea.
The new relax scratch bed is also something they like. This scratch pad and bed in one if now Yellow’s preferred place… from the many she has around the house. I keep it inside, close to the balcony door, but while the weather is good I move it outside, as I discovered Yellow loves to use it as a perch to sit/lay comfortably while watching the world go by. That’s what she is doing right now, while I write these notes!
I guess this gives you an idea, along with the photos, of how Yellow and Luna are celebrating their days with us. There is so much else going on, that I would need to write a book to tell every little thing that amazes us and makes part of the “being owned by a cat”. Yes, because more and more I believe we own nothing, if someone owns, its them. Or maybe we are just celebrating a friendship where we take the responsibility to care for them, as we’ve accepted them in our homes. Which is theirs too, now.
