In the middle of the night on May 9, 1992, one of the the family cats gave birth to a litter of 7 kittens under my bed. Three of the kittens were stillborn, four survived. Two weeks later, the mother cat went outside and never came back, leaving me and my sister to bottle-feed the entire litter. They thrived. When the time came, we found homes for two of the kittens and decided to keep two, one for me and one for my sister. I chose the adorable gray kitten who had woken me the night of his birth with his loud mewling and named him Sebastian. She chose the very talkative and stubborn all black kitten and named her Persi (short for persistence). We kept them together for years, moving them with us as we moved. First from one town to another, then from one state to another (and another!) until they finally ended up in Connecticut with us. They were both very old by that point (2002 or 2003, I think), and Sebastian had developed a heart condition that he eventually died from (in 2003, I think it was). Persi, grateful to be an only cat at last, went to live with my TAS in 2005. Now, my sister having gone through a bad break-up  over the past couple of weeks, has moved back in with us. And of course, Persi came with her.

Persi is very old. She’ll be 17 this year. She doesn’t see very well. Or hear. And she’s a borderline diabetic (see how she’s in the bath with a cup of water?). But she’s still stubborn and as talkative as ever. She and Doozer are still trying to negotiate a peaceful coexistence and Doozer, I must say, is taking it rather well. We’d always assumed that he wasn’t a cat person, but after about 5 days of cohabitation, he’s now trying to figure out how to get her to play with him. Unfortunately she’s not that kind of kitty any more (and she really is NOT a cat person). At least they’re not trying to kill each other.