Joelly was a short-haired white and grey-patched cat. She had tabby stripes in those patches. I’m not sure what kind of coloring that’s called, but she was a round, very sweet cat. And patient to the extreme. I have vivid memories of delighting in trapping her by putting a milk crate on top of her, and—particularly painful to think of as an adult—tossing her off the deck. I was probably 2. And I think the memory is so vivid because I remember my mother being very upset with me for doing it, and me be very, very confused as to why it was so wrong.
My memories of feeling bad for being mean to her are also very young. I learned that lesson pretty early and quickly, I think, because I remember her being very sweet with me when I was very little, and thinking that I didn’t deserve it because of what I’d done when I was even younger.
Joelly loved to be pet, she’d always come when called, and she drooled sparkly, viscous pearls whenever she was feeling especially comfy and loved.
Tuffy, on the other hand, wanted nothing to do with me when I was a young terror. I remember being very surprised when I was old enough to act properly around a cat and realizing that she, too, was a love bug just like Joelly. She’d simply, and smartly stayed away from me before that point. After, she loved to see me, though she was always a bit more independent than Joelly was. She’d go off and hunt for her own food, and she looked every bit the fearsome hunter.
In retrospect, she looked a bit like a Mane Coon, though I’m sure she wasn’t a thoroughbred. Tabby stripes, long dark grey hair with even darker black tabby stripes, and big yellow eyes. She was big, too. Very soft, and very sweet…when I was old enough to deserve such treatment.
I don’t remember what happened to them. I think they each just disappeared one day. I have a vague recollection, perhaps, that one of them—Joelly, I think—went off to live with a neighbor at some point. That was a common thing with animals in those days, I guess. Seems most of my mom’s animals when I was young were given to her by other people, or simply showed up on our doorstep one day.
Wild times.
I’ll always be grateful for Joelly for being so forgiving of me, so patient as to know that I was too little to understand what I was doing. And I’m grateful that I knew her long enough to have grown up and eventually given her the kind of gentle care and love that she deserved.
Night night.