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| Naomi mothering an abandoned kitten - reluctantly! |
There
are lots of us living here and my mom tries to give us all equal
attention. But one of my friends is very
sick. She’s a young calico cat – female
of course – and she came from a place called Agios Dimitris, where there is a large
church and a lot of sad cats – maybe a hundred or more.
Anyway,
a while ago, my mom went there with a friend and rescued two small
kittens. Mom’s friend is Scottish and
wanted to rehome a tiny ginger kitten, who looked very sickly and his friend; another
calico cat wanted to come along too.
So,
from being the only house cat, I suddenly had to share everything. At first I was a bit jealous, but after a few
days, I realised it was fun to have other kittens to play with and I enjoyed
their company. The ginger cat was named
McDuff as it’s a Scottish name, the calico became known as Naomi; I’m not sure
why.
We
spent a lot of time together and always curled up for a cuddle at night and
during siesta. Naomi was quite clever
and could find out how things worked, but McDuff was quiet. I think he was relieved to be somewhere
safe. He couldn’t even eat at
first. While Naomi and I fed on cat
biscuits and meat, my mom had to feed him milk and soup with a dropper. She was very worried about him and took him
to the doctor a couple of times. But he
soon began to gain weight and look better.
Naomi
was fine until just before Christmas. My
mom had been away and Flora; our neighbour who helps look after us had been
with her. But we had a nice friendly
carer living in the house, so it wasn’t too disruptive. The first sign that she wasn’t well was when
she developed a wobbly walk. We were all
worried. She wasn’t in pain, but her
back legs wouldn’t work properly. We
tried to support here and mom took her to the doctor’s for an X-Ray, to see if
she had had an accident. But there
didn’t seem to be any damage.
Then
in the middle of the night, she had a fit.
It was horrible and mom called Flora to come and see her. The next day they went back to the
doctor. She was much worse. We all got excluded from the bedroom, where
we usually sleep at night. The doctor
was worried she might be infectious and we could catch something from her. She had blood tests and antibiotics but
nothing helped and she just got worse and worse. I tried to sneak in to see her, but mom was
determined to keep me out.
After
about a week, mom told us that Naomi was dead.
She was crying, so was Flora – we all were. We had been such good friends. Flora dug a grave for her in the garden, near
the lavender and they buried her, while we all watched. They put some stones on top to mark the spot
and a few bright red geraniums. It was
all very sad, especially as she was such a young cat. We cats don’t cry like humans, but we do feel
unhappy sometimes. McDuff, who had been
with Naomi since he was born, was dismal for many days.
Other
cats in the outside colony had died, but this time, we had all lost a close
friend.
We
all moved into another bedroom, so mom could clean thoroughly, to avoid us
catching whatever Naomi had. I gave her
special cuddles, whenever I could to try to cheer her up.
A
few days later, a friend of my mom’s arrived.
‘I’ve got a Christmas present for you’, he said. He opened his jacket and inside was a tiny
hairy white kitten, with huge eyes that looked like she had applied make-up
like my mom sometimes does. She was
hungry and crying. Of course she stayed
and we all tried to make her welcome. My
mom called her Amelia and she settled in really quickly.
We’re
all pleased to have her here.
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