Feral Fables

So over the next few months as I healed, alone at home (my husband at work), I cared for the cats the best I could. Right after back surgery------I didn't even want to get out of bed, (even though I was supposed to get up and move around) but now I did have the cats to look after. In the beginning this was basically just putting out food for them. Sometimes this was quite humorous. Picture not being able to bend over or stoop down much (because of the stupid brace) and trying to feed a cat a bowl of kibble. There were times I literally just had to pour the kibble on the deck. The cats didn't mind though. But I got better at devising means of dispensing the food properly and over time my movement improved too. That winter, watching the cats was my (our) pastime. It became a habit-----always walking by the window or porch door to see "what's going on." I heard another writer coin this action as "cat patrol" which fits perfectly. One of the things you do to recover from the type of back surgery I had, is to walk. Well, in Wisconsin, in the middle of winter, nobody walks outside anywhere if they don't have to. So I used to do laps around the house and as I did them, I'd watch outside for any "cat action." I must have spent hundreds of hours that first winter on "cat patrol." The kittens had been born about Sept. 1 so that winter, they were learning about the world------which was my backyard. All the world unfolded to them with their mother, Snow, close by their sides and their other mother, me, never too far behind---always watching from the window, slowly healing with each day.