When I moved in with Steve, he already had a cat.
Penny was a beautiful fluff-ball of a Tuxedo cat who clearly did not know how to cat.
Penny spent the morning (or anytime a human would enter the bathroom) sitting in the bathtub staring up waiting for someone to turn on the tap to the perfect drip of whatever stream of water was in her mind. She’d lick the water until you turned the tap off, if you did it right. If you did it wrong, she’d run away.
I found her stares somewhat threatening.
Penny would not cuddle. She was reluctant to being petted. The idea of purring felt like a foreign language to her as far as I could tell. She did it from time to time, but it seemed forced. If you’ve ever seen Resident Alien1, she’s the cat version of Harry Vanderspeigle.
By all appearances, she did not know how to cat.
I have had cats all my life. I know cats.
My first cat was Shadows. She was a feral cat that my uncles David and Fred brought home to me for my 7th birthday. They rescued her off the streets of Haight/Ashbury where they were living in the late 60s/early 70s.
My dad, their oldest brother, was very upset about this cat. So was my mom. But my parents couldn’t do anything about it because I was already in love! And this cat was a gift! And dad and mom are both Southern, so boundaries around returning unwanted gifts were impossible to enforce.
Shadows was a Tortie.2 I named her Shadows because when they brought her to me, she hid under the car seat for hours. We couldn’t get her out. I laid my head on the floor behind the backseat of David’s Volkswagen and stared at her glowing eyes under the seat in the darkness waiting for her to come out.
Once she decided to explore, she was in my arms and she was mine.
She slept with me under the covers as my belly curved around her body. She followed me around like a dog. She struck out with her claws randomly at family members that bothered her—and every family member bothered her. Except me.
Shadows was my familiar. She was my forever cat.
Shadows was an indoor/outdoor cat. She never needed a litter box. At the end of the day, I’d come out to the front yard and call her.
We had a language I thought I had invented. I’d never call out ‘Shadows’ to bring her home, I’d call ‘Suma’ and she’d come. I don’t know why. I didn’t know the word. It was a word that just came to me. I’d call out ‘Suma’ and she’d come.
I now know that ‘suma’ is the word for ‘sum or addition’ in Spanish.
She did feel like an addition to my safety and soul—maybe part of the sum of me.
She moved with me to Chicago when I was 14 and my parents divorced. She lived in my room, cat box and all, because the apartment was small and we were on the second floor. She wasn’t an outdoor cat anymore.
Learning the cat box was annoying to both of us. She hated using it, I hated cleaning it. The room was small. No room to roam. She complained loudly.
One day, while I was at school, my mom decided to let Shadows out on the streets of Chicago to allow her to have some outdoor time. When I got home, she wasn’t there. I called ‘Suma’ for hours and then days and she never came home.
Fall turned to winter and she never came home.
Six months after my mom let her out, my step-father came home with Shadows under his arm. He found her standing there behind a fence in the snow just blocks away from our apartment.
People must have been feeding her and taking care of her, but letting her have her freedom. Whatever happened, I was so grateful to have her back. I am to this day.
Shadows moved with me my senior year of high school when I decided to leave my mom and step-dad and move in with my dad and his wife in Eugene, OR.
She moved in with me and my first college boyfriend my freshman year.
Shadows and I went from apartment to apartment together as I cycled through various relationships and cities.
She was there during my first marriage and then moved with me into the first apartment that I had on my own when that relationship failed.
I was 29 when she died.
She still shows up in my dreams—human-sized, standing-up like a Ghibli character. She holds my hand and we walk and talk or we get out of whatever scuffle I am in when it’s a horror dream. I have a lot of those.
She is my forever cat.
I’ve had so many others since Shadows!
I was step-mom to Bubbles, a beloved tabby cat of my partners when we moved in together. We adopted Bali, an aloof little girl, and Old Man, an older Maine Coon Cat that we rescued the day before they were going to put him down. We added Hopey to the mix as well. She was a cuddly and adorable American Shorthair mutt that resonated with Shadows energy only kinder. Tyler kept all of them together when I moved across the country.
And then there was Mary.
Ethan was 4 when the three of us moved into our new Portland home that he promptly dubbed ‘The Number 9 House.’ Joel, Ethan, and I walked up the stairs, boxes in hand, to the grassy courtyard with a blooming dogwood tree in the center and twelve neat little doors, each labeled with a gold number. Ours, obviously, was nine.
A tiny, lithe, little brown tabby greeted us on the way up. The man sitting outside on a camping chair in front of door number four said, “That’s Mary.”
I laughed. That was the first time I had ever heard of a pet with a human name. Mary followed us into our new home as if it was hers.
I always make it a point to get to know my neighbors wherever I live and our little courtyard off of Glisan Street was no exception. There was Ben in number four, who told us about Mary. He was a single dad with a son just a few years older than Ethan. Grant gave Ethan his very first copy of Captain Underpants3, a beloved book for years. Jason lived in number seven and taught meditation at the studio two blocks from our place. Rebecca and Julie lived right next to us in number ten. They were the moms to Mary. At the very end of the courtyard, in number twelve, was an older woman who rarely came out to say hello. I never got her name. She had lived there well before Ben moved in and he had been there for more than ten years. The rest of the courtyard was a rotating bunch of young people that stayed a few months and then left.
The summer we moved in I spent a lot of time on our front stoop chatting with Ben. He would bring out his grill and I’d make shrimp skewers in satay sauce and the women in ten would bring burgers. Salad was on Jason. Whoever else was around would join us with whatever happened to be in their house or nothing at all. In August we hired a band to celebrate summer birthdays. We’d hang out around that dogwood tree and talk and laugh and eat and dance.
Our door was open more often than not and Mary would prance right on in whenever she wanted to. We always had a bowl of cat food available just in case. During the rainy winter, if she wasn’t curled up and cozy in number ten, she’d wait outside our door until someone got home to let her in.
When Rebecca and Julie decided to move to Seattle, they asked if we could keep Mary. Joel was not a fan of pets and definitely not cats, but he couldn’t say no to Mary. She was Ethan’s and my cat.
The next year we bought our first house and Mary came along with us.
Mary was an indoor/outdoor cat. She never needed a litter box. At the end of the day, she somehow always made it back inside. She’d make a nightly choice about which human to sleep with and spread herself pretty evenly between me and Ethan.
When Joel and I divorced five years later, Mary stayed with me. It was then that she started to curl up against me under the covers. She’d lick my eyelids to wake me up. Her purrs came easily and she would love on anyone that would let her.
When Ethan decided during his sophomore year of high school that he was tired of the weekly shuffling between households and he wanted to live with his dad, Mary stayed with me. Two middle-aged ladies living alone.
Mary was with me as I began to explore polyamory. She came with me after I sold the house and moved in with my triad4.
My partners already had a cat. Dweeze was a Russian Blue and this house was his territory. He was an indoor/outdoor cat with no interest in another cat in his space.
Mary was an older cat by then and couldn’t acclimate easily, so she lived in my bedroom with her very first cat box. She hated using it and I hated cleaning it and she had kidney failure.
Ethan and I held her in the garden by the waterfall when the vet put her to sleep. She leaned into it like relief. She had been in so much pain.
I was 53 when she died. Ethan was 16.
Mary is my broken heart cat.
I don’t see her in my dreams—at least not yet. I do think of her often and I miss her body curled up against mine.
I left my traid and moved in with Steve and Penny in 2022. Ethan went off to college.
I had never met a cat like Penny. She was barely there. Mostly just fluff with a fear of being touched. Snuggling was absolutely off the table. Her purrs would barely register.
And I had a need for a cat that would cuddle.
Steve had a need to limit the amount of fur balls on the carpet and the smell of cat litter. So, I learned to make my peace with cleaning the cat box.
Three years later, Steve finally relented and agreed to go to the Humane Society to look at cats. I was thrilled! The story was, we were just looking. We weren’t going to get a cat that day. We both knew that was a lie.
There in one of the top cages curled up against the bars was a jet black cat with piercing yellowish green eyes. The label said ‘Lotus.’ We touched her through the bars. She was the softest cat I had ever touched.
The Adoption Specialist said they weren’t sure, but she might be a Bombay cat5. She had been shuttled around to various homes in her two years on the planet, so she was a bit squirrely.
We asked to see her and he brought her into a room with us.
We sat on the floor and she crawled under the bench. But, she let us lie on the floor and reach out to touch her. She purred loudly. She rolled over to let us touch her belly. She just needed to be in a safe space.
We brought her home.
The first few weeks she spent hiding behind couches and under bookshelves. We’d reach out when we could find her. We weren’t sure she was eating, so we turned on the camera in the kitchen to see if she ever came out. Sure enough, the motion-activated camera would pick her up in the middle of the night. That said, the minute she’d close her eyes the camera would shut off. Her fur was so black she was undetectable. It was as if she disappeared.
From the very beginning, Lotus didn’t seem like the right name for her. Spiritual awakening wasn’t really her jam. Like Shadows, she hid until she finally came out.
We named her Shadow.
Shadow is now that cuddly cat that curls up against my belly and legs. She snuggles up against Steve and loves playing ‘fishing for cats’ with him. She wakes me up in the morning with a head but and licks my face and eyelids. She purrs readily and throws herself on the ground exposing her belly to invite pets. She follows me around like a dog. This cat knows how to cat like my forever cat!
Penny remains her awkward self, but watches Shadow curiously when she trots down the stairs demanding food; passionately plays with her toys; or nestles her body up against us at the end of the day.
At 60, I find myself with another seminal cat. Shadow brings back the feeling of my time with her namesake—that magical and somehow still ordinary connection. Shadow doesn’t go outside. We made a promise when we adopted her. The litter box is part of my weekly routine. I don’t complain. It’s worth it to have this love in the house.
Penny watches from a distance. Maybe she’ll learn how to cat in her own time, in her own way. I've come to appreciate her quirky presence too—not every cat needs to follow the rulebook. Maybe that's the lesson in all of this: we all find our own way to connection. Some of us dive right in, bellies exposed; others take the long way around, one hesitant paw step at a time.
Ethan has graduated college. He comes to visit from time to time. He’s one of the most emotionally intelligent humans I know. I am so grateful for him in my life. We enjoy each others company and he’s grown to be a cat lover as well.
As I enter this next stage in my life, there's purring in the house again, warm bodies shifting in the night beside me, and the quiet understanding that comes from sharing my space with creatures who see me exactly as I am—no more, no less. Just perfectly, imperfectly human.
From Wikipedia: Tortoiseshell is a cat coat coloring named for its similarity to tortoiseshell pattern. Like tortoiseshell-and-white or calico cats, tortoiseshell cats are almost exclusively female. Male tortoiseshells are rare and are usually sterile.
No, I don’t use the word throuple. I find that word cutesy and annoying. You might as well call it a threelationship. Yuck!
From Wikipedia: The Bombay cat is a short-haired breed of domestic cat. Bombays are glossy solid black cats with a muscular build, and have characteristic large bright copper-golden eyes. The breed is named after the Indian city of Bombay (Mumbai), referring to the habitat of the Indian black leopard.
To all the cats I've loved before: Alexander, Color Puffs, Sasha, Mama, Miles, Emma, Dude, and Joey. ❤️
I have to say, I chuckled at the image of Penny just waiting for the perfect drip of water! Cats are such wonderfully eccentric creatures, aren't they? And your honest account of hating the litter box—so relatable! It's funny how these small, sometimes unpleasant, details are such an integral part of the bond. It’s a reminder that love and connection aren't just about the warm and fuzzy moments, they’re also about the shared daily grind, the quirks and challenges that come with sharing our lives with another being. Your vulnerability in sharing these less glamorous aspects of pet ownership makes your love for them feel all the more genuine and powerful, as do your anecdotes about when it was all so wonderful. I think the contrast makes the happy times even more meaningful.