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The Mystery of the phantom tom cat
Sep. 30th, 2015 02:44 amFunny the things you think of in the middle of the night. I was just thinking about the woman who turned up at my door TWICE about a cat I didn't have.
The first time she turned up, she wanted me to come and get "my cat" - some tomcat that was living under her house. Only, I DIDN'T HAVE A TOMCAT. At the time I had Gabby and Xena, two girl cats (who were at the time she knocked on the front door, in my lounge room). Someone had told her that the tom lived under MY house. I had no idea who she was or where she lived but to the best of my knowledge there had never been a tome cat that lived under MY house. Who'd told her that?
Some years later she turned up again. She said she was moving interstate and had been feeding "my" cat all that time and would I please come and collect it now? I said I'd never owned whatever cat this was and knew nothing about it. She said "it was up to me to look after my pets" and went away, presumably abandoning the cat she'd come to care for all that time. But what sort of person just does that - cares for a cat and then brushes it off as someone else's, even when that someone else says they know nothing about it?
A week after she came the second time, there was a shabby long haired tabby that turned up in my backyard (and next door's as well). This is when Alix and Anna used to live next door so it was a fair while ago. It would show up when I fed my pets, meowing for food. It did, until I threw a bucket of water over it, and never saw it again!
Now of course in the last two years, Mystery turned up as a kitten and I adopted him, and Nemesis is a black cat that does "live under my house". But in both cases I noticed them first - it wasn't something that happened without my knowing. Nemesis was at first the "half a cat" seen scurrying around corners and running under the house when I got near, so I knew that it was there. This mysterious tom cat that I was supposed to own, I never saw or heard, so I don't think it every did. But, why would she believe the word of someone else who told her that the cat lived under my house, and not mine? I wish I'd asked her just who claimed it had, but the moments are long past.
The first time she turned up, she wanted me to come and get "my cat" - some tomcat that was living under her house. Only, I DIDN'T HAVE A TOMCAT. At the time I had Gabby and Xena, two girl cats (who were at the time she knocked on the front door, in my lounge room). Someone had told her that the tom lived under MY house. I had no idea who she was or where she lived but to the best of my knowledge there had never been a tome cat that lived under MY house. Who'd told her that?
Some years later she turned up again. She said she was moving interstate and had been feeding "my" cat all that time and would I please come and collect it now? I said I'd never owned whatever cat this was and knew nothing about it. She said "it was up to me to look after my pets" and went away, presumably abandoning the cat she'd come to care for all that time. But what sort of person just does that - cares for a cat and then brushes it off as someone else's, even when that someone else says they know nothing about it?
A week after she came the second time, there was a shabby long haired tabby that turned up in my backyard (and next door's as well). This is when Alix and Anna used to live next door so it was a fair while ago. It would show up when I fed my pets, meowing for food. It did, until I threw a bucket of water over it, and never saw it again!
Now of course in the last two years, Mystery turned up as a kitten and I adopted him, and Nemesis is a black cat that does "live under my house". But in both cases I noticed them first - it wasn't something that happened without my knowing. Nemesis was at first the "half a cat" seen scurrying around corners and running under the house when I got near, so I knew that it was there. This mysterious tom cat that I was supposed to own, I never saw or heard, so I don't think it every did. But, why would she believe the word of someone else who told her that the cat lived under my house, and not mine? I wish I'd asked her just who claimed it had, but the moments are long past.
