“I rescued this tiny kitten from a restaurant parking lot over the weekend. Would you like to come and meet her?”
This was a former library employee, Martha Ebener, standing at my desk one Monday morning in 2003. Martha knew that I had lost my beloved cat Boris, age 14, to cancer about a year before, and that I was currently cat-less. Martha has an uncanny knack for finding a homeless animal and matching it with someone who may or may not have realized that they needed this animal in their life. I hadn’t really been thinking about getting another cat anytime soon, but agreed to at least go over and have a look.
A few days later I went over to Martha’s to meet this tiny bundle of joy. And by tiny I do mean tiny! She could easily curl up in the palm of your hand and take a nap, which is exactly what she was doing when I arrived. She woke up, and no sooner had Martha set her down on the floor than she climbed up my leg using her razor-sharp kitten claws. Me-OWWWW!!! (That was me, not her.) I guess this was her way of “claiming” me, by using me as a scratching post. What else could I do but take her home?
I named her Kitka, after a character in the 1966 Batman movie starring Adam West and Burt Ward. Miss Kitka was the Russian reporter alter ego of The Catwoman, as played by Lee Meriwether. (It’s a great movie, by the way, featuring all of the classic Batman villains. I have it on DVD if you’d like to borrow it.)
It took me a minute to become accustomed to having a cat again. A very energetic kitty, she was! I remember sitting on the sofa watching her running around and jumping on things and thinking, “Wow, I can’t believe I have a kitten!” Once I kitten-proofed my apartment, all was well.
Nowadays, at age 16, Kitka is not the jumping bean that she once was. She’s had a few health issues in recent years but seems to be feeling pretty good most of the time. She still greets me at the door when I come home, eager to have her food dish refilled. She still loudly demands that I come over and sit down RIGHT NOW so that she can curl up on my lap and go to sleep. Fortunately she gave up on using my leg as a scratching post long ago!
Leave a Reply