Catching Up I: Comings and Goings

Two days after B. turned 8 our kitty cat Luna didn't come home. She didn't come home all that week. I began to realize how much I had come to want her around and how soothing it had been to have a warm, soft cat to sit on your lap that you can mindlessly stroke and be rewarded with loud, contented purring. She would sit peacefully on my lap in the afternoons as long as I would let her, and even go to sleep. Caring for a cat, even in the midst of caring for four children, a husband, a business, a home, a yard, a garden was something easy. She didn't need her self-esteem stroked, only her fur. She didn't need me to mediate arguments or solve problems or go to parent-teacher conferences for her. She didn't need me to check on whether she had her homework done or was caught up on her reading. She just needed food scooped out of a bag and plopped in her bowl, fresh water, and plenty of playing outside. Oh, and a comfy lap to sit on and be stroked. What could be more simple. I missed her more and more as the week went on. Six days later a neighbor brought her over. She had wandered into another neighbor's garage and visited them for the week. We were all delighted and grateful to have her home. The kids (and I) had been praying for her safety and homecoming, and several of the children said we needed to say a prayer to Heavenly Father for answering our prayers. We did.

On the other hand, our tarantula Harriette has left us for the Great Beyond. We had had her nine years, and she had been with several other owners before coming to our family. I had finally purchased some crickets at the pet store to feed her after she molted a few weeks ago, but when I went into the laundry room to put them into her cage I found her on her back in her dry water dish with legs tightly curled up. It's hard to mourn for a spider, frankly, but I did feel that I had let her down, even if she was old. I couldn't just throw her in the garbage either, so I donated her body and her molted exoskeleton to science -- specifically O.'s science teacher at school, who said he would be delighted to have her for class. So now we're down to four chickens, two fire belly toads and one white polydactyl cat (Luna has seven toes on one front paw and six on the other).