Sad news.....

For those of you who have read Homer's Odyssey about Homer the Blind Wondercat, you may already know this. But, if not, his mom Gwen Cooper and his family let him run to the Rainbow Bridge last Wednesday. She posted to his facebook page on Sunday.

Mom first read Gwen's book a few years ago. She has read it many times since then. While on it's face, it is a book about a woman and her cat, it is more than that. Throughout the book, Gwen comments that she learns from Homer that what people view as a "disability" for Homer, is not a big deal for him. He has no idea that he is different and no idea that he isn't "normal". It is a lesson that we all can learn.

Most recently, mom reread the book last summer. Last summer we had two "special" kittens that we fostered.

Doc was rescued while helping some former adopters found kittens and asked for help with rescuing the kittens and doing some TNR. After some time in the house, mom discovered that Doc was deaf. And he had no idea.

The best part, mom was at an event Friday night and was approached by a mother and daughter. The mom said "you may not remember us but we adopted Doc last summer". OMG!!  They spoke for a while and the daughter found a picture of Doc on her phone. He has grown into a big handsome mancat - they say he is long and lean. And the daughter has to leave her door closed as Doc is a certified thief.

Then came Bourbon. Mom realized right off that there was something different about him. After x-rays, we learned he was born without kneecaps. And like Doc, he was adopted by a wonderful family who doesn't care that he is "different".

So, purrs to Gwen and Lawrence. And THANK YOU for making people more aware that being different shouldn't be a death sentence.  Doc and Bourbon may not have ever been given a chance in some shelters. We are lucky that we are associated with a rescue that is willing to take chances and is no-kill. 

Fly Free Homer.

If we only knew.....

Mom has read the book "Homer's Odyssey" about Homer the Blind Cat. (and if you haven't read the book, mom HIGHLY recommends it)  He has his own website and blog and facebook and everything. Anyhow, they lost their older cats and after a long thought period, decided to get another cat. She is an adult calico now named Stella. You can see the whole blog post here.

But there was one paragraph in the blog post that mom said she could relate to:
"Stella, of course, has no way of knowing that Homer is crying to be with me. All she knows is that Homer is loudly demanding entry into “her” side of our home. She hisses at him through the gate, but a little hissing has never fazed Homer. Scarlett used to hiss at him all the time, but neither of them was ever looking for a fight, and Scarlett never did more than hiss, so Homer’s philosophy when it comes to another cat hissing is pretty much, “Oh, hush, you old crank.” When the hissing has no effect, Stella crouches down, flattens her ears and whiskers, puffs up her fur, etc. But Homer, naturally, can’t see any of this and thus can’t pick up on any visual cues that Stella is becoming increasingly agitated. And Stella, who has no idea that Homer can’t see, clearly views Homer’s indifference as a signal that she needs to ratchet up the aggressive behavior in order to get her message across."

We had something similar with Junior when he got here.

(can you believe he used to be that little????)

He was our first venture into feral kittens. Maybe a little too old, but mom just couldn't be ok with putting this cute face back outside.....

So, he would get mad and hiss at the rest of us. Which, after lots of foster kittens, we ignore. Plus, he was little and not very scary. And after a few days, he caught on - hissing isn't going to work and should be ignored. And then Maestro hissed at him to get Junior to leave - and Junior ignored Maestro (and mom cracked up when Junior got whacked for insubordination). We were lucky in that Junior, in being a social dork, didn't feel the need to challenge the status quo and settled in well.

We wish Homer, his new sisfur Stella and the parents the best....we know they can work through this..... and hope Stella doesn't start using the MUCH smaller Homer for target practice. :)

(Junior now....haha)