Dreaming Paris

I was cleaning up things in the house when I realized the kittens had been quiet for awhile. I figured that they were asleep, but because my cleaning led to me deciding to move the litterbox, I went to find them so that I could show them where I was moving it to. They were nowhere to be found. I mean nowhere. I realized that I couldn’t remember seeing them since I’d taken the trash out, and I panicked. I raced all over the house looking EVERYWHERE that I could think of that a kitten could hide. I called and called. Usually, when I do that, one or the other one appears. In fact, I’ve never had both of them go missing like that. It’s usually only one of them who finds some new place or other to sleep where no one thinks to look. If one of them is around, it’s a sure thing the other one is, too, somewhere. But neither of them were responding to my calls.

I tried opening and closing the sliding glass doors. When Numa hears that, he comes running, trying to beat us to the close. No Numa. How could they have gotten out? I would have noticed. I was so careful to open and close the front door quickly so they couldn’t follow me out. But obviously they’d done it somehow.

At that point I was crying copiously. This isn’t happening, this isn’t happening. Breathe. Remember how many times your own children got lost and you always found them. (Only my boys, actually. They were good at running off when you weren’t looking. One time, my mom, brother, ex-sister-in-law, her husband, my husband, and I took our kids to the zoo and we lost my sons. None of us knew where they’d run off to, everyone saying, “But I thought they were up ahead with you…I thought they were still behind with you.” Talk about panic. The relief at seeing the two of them over on the next hill, big brother in the lead (9), watching over little brother (6), was so…well…relieving!) So I go out the front door and walk the block, calling the way I always do in the house. No kitties.

I come back in the house and resume crying, then call my husband, still in hysterics. “I’ve lost the kittens. I’ve looked everywhere. I searched the neighborhood. I can’t find them. They’re gone. I don’t how this happened.” “I’m coming home.”

I breathe again. Okay, they’re micro-chipped. Call the company. My husband comes home while I’m doing this. I finish the phone call and run into his arms, crying once again. “I can’t believe this is happening.” He does his own search inside and out. No kitties.

I do up the flyer you see above, but before printing it, I do one last opening of the sliding door and calling their names. I close the door, near tears again, and turn around, just in time to see Numa coming around the corner of the piano. Where one is, the other won’t be far behind. I scooped him up and held him tight, reassured that Maddy had to be around somewhere.

I’d searched under my bed already, but there is so much stuff stored under there. That had to be where he’d come from, though. I peered under, using the bedside lamp to light up the dark. No Maddy. Then Numa popped back under the bed. The only reason he’d do that once he was wide awake would be to chase his sister. So I looked once more, and suddenly, to the right of Numa, I see a paw reach up between some boxes, and then an ear.

I seriously do not want to go through this again. Of all the pets I’ve ever had, I’ve never been this hysterical over them disappearing. I’ve got it bad this time around.

Oh, and the no collar comment on the sign? Well, their collars are still too big, and I was worried that they’d get caught on something and choke to death while we were sleeping or something, so I took them off. See? I’m losing it. But I’m going to a specialty store this time and find collars that will fit. They must have bells. I must be able to hear them when they move.

Remember the water bottle post? It took ONE day. ONE DAY for them to learn what get down means with using the water. I only have to use it occasionally when they decide to be deliberately stubborn, but usually a simple get down will do it. Especially with Maddy. If it doesn’t, all I have to do is pick up the bottle and point it at them and they’re off like a shot. Why have I never used this with any of my other cats before? No more yelling or clapping or getting up to get them down. It’s great!

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I put collars on the kittens with their rabies tags. Maddy is going especially nuts. She’s taking a short rest,  panting away after her exertions to rid herself of the irritating neckband. What they don’t know is that as soon as they settle into them, they’ll be allowed outside. I had hoped to at least keep Maddy in, but it’s a no go. The way they run to the doors as soon as they hear them open, it won’t be long before they make it out on their own.

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Mademoiselle is her given name, and I do call her that, but mostly she’s my Miss Maddy.

Don’t let that sweet sleeping face fool you. She is the instigator of all kitten shenanigans. The doer of all things naughty. She’s the curtain climber, the plant digger, the bowl breaker, and the explorer of the highest of high things. She is also the brother baiter, and the older cat’s bane of existence. Oh, and let’s not forget, the biter of toes. She is the terror of our household.

Numa, big brother (in size, but I don’t know who was born first), when left to his own devices, chases dust bunnies and paper balls and stares out of windows, longing for the great wide world.

He follows people, wanting to be wherever the action is, and sometimes, he’ll play with long flowing robes that swish by him. He bites toes, too, but only when they’re under blankets and move around. He sometimes swats at the plant leaves that hang, or the curtains when the fans move them. He jumps on tables, too, because that’s what cats do, but he’s never jumped to stand precariously upon the top of a chair back just because it’s higher. Nor has he been interested in jumping from the piano bench to the top of the piano only to notice that one can get to the kitchen counter from there. He’s an explorer of the low ground. He also respects the older male cat, only sometimes swatting his tail when it’s just too tempting, but mostly he just follows him in admiration, happy to be allowed to be near him.

Enter Miss Maddy. She cannot abide such tame doings. Oh, no. She must stir the pot and pounce on what rises to the top. She encourages her brother in all sorts of bad manners, and steals the older cat’s favorite toys, places to sleep, and peace of mind, right out from under him. And she thinks that feet are her personal chew toys.

You wouldn’t think that to look at this picture, would you? Numa looks like the one most likely to leave mayhem and destruction in his wake. That’s him on the left, bright-eyed, ready for anything. You know what Maddy’s doing? She’s biding her time, lulling you into thinking she’s a lazy cat who can’t be bothered with adventures. (Actually, she was sleeping, and I disturbed her with my picture taking.)

At first I thought that she was the smart one because she learned what No! and Get down! means first. Silly me. Of course she learned quickly. She was the one who heard it being shouted at her the most. I don’t know what it is about my plant by the window, but she loves to sit in it. And she will do it just to make me mad, I swear she will. You can see it in her eyes as she looks at me before jumping into the plant as if to say, ha! I’m going to do it ANYWAY. When she was a very little kitten, she seemed to be learning to do as told when I would tell her to get down. Usually, I would have to get up and walk toward her first, but at least she understood I wanted her down and would comply. But now that she’s solidly settled in as family, I think she thinks the people are just big cats to annoy like she does her brother and Tiger because she fights with us just like she does with them.

Firmness and an angry tone don’t work. That just incites her to deliberate mischief. As do smacks to her rump while making her get down. I had to prevent my plant from falling and the pot breaking in one such attempt because she clung to it so tightly, determined to win the battle of the plant.

So if she wants war, she has it now. It’s much more fun than yelling and smacking. Not to mention more humane. I have a water bottle. It has a far reaching stream. I don’t need to get up. I don’t need to yell. I simply say, “Maddy, get down,” and squirt. It’s beautiful. Am I a horrible person to get such a kick out of this? She’s off like a shot to lick herself dry and doesn’t come back for the same mischief.

She finds different mischief instead. That’s my sweet Maddy.

Actually, she is very sweet in between her bouts of ADHD behavior, and I don’t mean while sleeping, either. She likes being held and cuddled, and she purrs almost constantly. I love my Maddy.

Here she is licking herself dry after her very first bath. No, I didn’t go that crazy with the water bottle. She really got a bath.

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I just put catnip on the cat’s favorite scratch and ball chase toy.

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They’re growing fast and beginning to lose some of their kittenish looks. Tiger still mostly treats them like invaders of his domain. He tries his best to ignore them or stay in parts of the house where they aren’t. Since it’s been raining so much, and he’s deathly afraid of thunderstorms, he doesn’t go out of the house unless we make him, and he’ll only stay on the back porch, mostly standing at the door wanting back in. The kittens, on the other hand, have no such fear. Maddy doesn’t really care about going outside, but Tiger is out there and she likes to annoy him. Tiger tolerates her. She’s on the right. Numa is on the left, and he wants to both get at Tiger to play, and he’s dying to explore the great outdoors.

Numa loves playing with Tiger. Tiger occasionally comes down from his throne of righteous indignation to humor the little one.

Tiger and Numa playing peekaboo

My mom would have a fit over where these cats like to sleep (after laughing just like I did), but I’m training them Mom! I just had to get this picture. Maddy is starting to learn, “Get down!” Numa, well…it may take a little longer.

Sleepy kitties. They make me laugh so much.

Miss Maddy’s rabbit imitation.

This pretty much sums Numa up. Nothing fazes him and he lives life with complete kitten abandon.

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My last day today. They gave me a nice party yesterday. I felt very loved and appreciated. I have a poster that they made for me and everyone who came signed it. I’m going to put it up in my home office, and one day it will be in my office at my tutoring cafe.

It still hasn’t sunk in yet that I no longer work there. I wonder when it will. I didn’t have to cart too much home because I’ve been bringing things home little by little over the last few weeks. I left everything so organized it makes me wish I could at least spend some more time working just to know what it feels like to have nothing to do at work. All projects completed, everything updated.

One of my original tutors, who has become a very dear friend, stopped in to see me and we had a very good chat. He graduated with a finance degree. He travels all over the country (and sometimes out of it), spending weekends here at home, though his company is based in New York, and he’s doing quite well. He is beginning to collect “toys”. His latest? A red Porsche. And his latest assignment? Las Vegas. Remember when I took my entire staff to Las Vegas for a tutoring convention in 2002? He was there, the youngest one, 19 years old. It’s so amazing to consider that he’ll soon be 26. He’s only a few months older than my oldest son.

Monday my younger son comes home from the army for a visit. I can’t wait. I’ll spend the weekend getting the house all in order and then just enjoy the time I can spend with him. I’m glad I won’t be away at work. I will be working, though. I have a lot to do to be ready for my virtual grand opening in September.

The kittens are growing, spending more time playing and less time sleeping, although, being cats, they still sleep a lot, of course. They’re very good natured. We were very lucky when we found these two. Tiger, my daughter’s cat, is finally beginning to play with them. He’ll even go so far as to wrestle a little with Numa. Numa is determined to turn Tiger into another playmate and is always attempting to get him to participate in his games with Maddy. Maddy is a little more temperamental. Sometimes she’ll want to include Tiger, sometimes not. Now that I’ll be home more, I’ll get some pictures of the three of them to post.

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We took the kittens to the vet yesterday just before noon for their exams and shots. The poor babies were so traumatized that they slept away the rest of yesterday and all of today, getting up only to eat and use the litter box before settling back down again.

It is now 1:30 in the morning. Trauma has been forgotten and they’re wilder than ever, chasing each other all over the place, doing fancy acrobatics in the air, and chasing dust bunnies and plastic paper bags.

They were just around 2 lbs. when we brought them home. Numa has always been slightly bigger and heavier. He now weighs 3.1 lbs and Maddy weighs 2.9.

Numa is dying to go outside. We have to be careful when we let Tiger out because Numa races to the back sliding glass door when he hears it opening. Then he looks outside with such longing. Maddy doesn’t care. She’s quite happy with all the things she finds to play with inside. Numa is the Adventurer, Maddy is the Fighter. She’s a scrappy little thing. I expect that were she to go outside, she’d be the one leaving presents at our door. Numa, on the other hand, would simply play with the creatures he found outside, probably killing some of them, but never with intention. I could be wrong, of course, but those are the natures that they’re displaying right now.

Since Numa is my husband’s cat, I imagine when he’s big enough, he’ll let him outside, if only because Numa will get past us one day, and R won’t care. But I’m going to do my darndest to keep Maddy an inside cat. Hopefully, her disinterest in the back porch will continue.

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Sister starts it. Brother finishes it.

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The kittens are such a big part of our lives now. I could talk about them endlessly. They’re providing so much entertainment and laughter.

We’ve named them finally. Mademoiselle (Maddy) and Numa (the lion in the Tarzan series by Edgar Rice Burroughs). They fit their names quite well.

Numa keeps trying to play with Tiger, my daughter’s 8 year old cat. It’s taking him awhile to get used to the interlopers of his domain. At least he lets them near enough to sniff noses now. I can’t ever seem to capture a picture in time, though, before Tiger takes off to another room to get away from them. Every time he comes in from outside he sniffs the air and looks all around as he walks, wanting to know where they are so that he can go somewhere else.

Numa is bigger and heavier than Maddy, and he can be quite rough in his play with her, but she holds her own. She has a temper and can be vicious if he gets too mean. He’s very easy going and easily amused. It’s as though they already reflect the personalities of their owners.

Here they are cleaning up after dinner.

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