Until recently, my nephew’s household included a sleek calico cat called Katurah. The following are some of his thoughts on his cat.
Katurah, my calico cat, always had some kind of respiratory problem. She sneezed constantly and had a wheezy kind of breathing. As a tiny kitten, her sneezes would knock her over, but as she grew older, it never seemed to be much of a problem – except for the owners who were not particularly fond of being in the direct line of a cat sneeze.
Katurah’s life-long respiratory problems masked another, more recent breathing problem. In the last week, we noticed she’d grown withdrawn and no longer came running to her supper dish. She wouldn’t respond to my whistle. We took her to the vet who was alarmed at her breathing. An x-ray showed that something in her chest (most likely a tumor) was making it difficult for her to breathe. After an injection of steroids and 48 hours of observation, no sign of improvement indicated that her prognosis was grave. I had to have Katurah euthanized.
Tara gave me Katurah when was she was just a kitten. I taught her to come when I whistled a particular sliding-up sound I made – and to ride on my shoulders. She often rode around balanced on my shoulders. When I took her to the vet, I could trust her to stay on my shoulders. Even as an adult cat, I never needed to crate her to take her in the car. Eventually, she grew too big for my shoulders, but she could sit under the back window of the car and watch. (At first, she tried sitting under the front windshield, but the dash offered her nothing to hold onto when we went around a corner.)
All of her life, Katurah followed me – but, not like a dog.
No, a cat wouldn’t be so obvious about such things. However, no matter where I was in the house, Katurah just happened to be in the same room. She loved watching me work on projects. If I was tinkering with something, she wanted to see what was happening. Often my tinkering was at the computer and she sat on top of the monitor keeping me company and watching me work.
Katurah could open cupboards. She’d hold the top of the door with her claws and walk backwards. This afforded her access to many shelves and drawers filled with interesting objects to explore, chew, sniff. The tops of drawers throughout the house showed the evidence of her technique, including the original gumwood drawers upstairs. I spent quite a bit of
effort trying to repair that wood before we sold the house this summer.
She especially liked to chew plastic. The day she found a filled plastic bag in a cupboard was the day Katurah discovered that she loved marshmallows. Loved them so much, she even reached up gently to me when I held one in my mouth and grabbed it with her teeth.
When my mother came to visit, she learned to never leave her purse open – if she did, Katurah would rifle through it looking for something plastic to chew. If my mother brought her sewing bag – we’d find the latest crocheting project strewn around the room.
Katurah often served as the household watch cat. From time to time we noticed that she’d growl and run away from the door. Invariably, about a minute later the doorbell would ring. Not even our dog had noticed that someone was coming.
One thing Katurah did not particularly like was to be petted. She’d tolerate it a little, but then she’d let us know that was enough. She preferred to do things together than be affectionate.
Katurah was just a pet – not a person. But, I loved her and I will miss her now that she is gone.
(Joan Hershberger is a reporter at the News-Times. E-mail her at joanh@everybody.org)