Hi and welcome back!

This is the story of how my cat, Nicky, rescued me and how we became a family.

It actually started years before I ever saw my boy.  I have always been a dog person.  I was three when I got my first dog, Buttons. She was a black and white beagle mixed with something else that we never did figure out. We grew up together and I lost her in my freshman year of college. I was totally devastated. My parents had been divorced and my Dad was remarried several years by the time we were able to convince my step-mom to get a dog for their house.  That got us Dusty, a yellow lab. After Dad and I convinced step-mom to allow us to have Dusty, more dogs just seemed to follow. At one point, they had four, yes four, at a time.  They favor rescue dogs the most, out of the eight or so dogs that they've had over the years, only three were from a breeder. Also, they favor older dogs normally, over the age of five, because their chances of getting forever homes are so much smaller than younger ones.  So, I've always wanted a dog of my own and was eagerly waiting to be in a home where I could get one.

While Dad and I were working on converting step-mom into a dog lover, she had her own plan. When they married, they bought a house in the country on 3/4 of an acre of land.  My Dad doesn't like cats very much, but he hates mice even more.  She managed to convince him that getting a cat would stop any mice problem from happening.  So, they got their first cat as a family, Whisper. Step-mom had a cat before they were married, but she died.  Whisper was NOT a good name for this cat. She was more like a roar!  The she-devil used to come behind me when I was sitting at the kitchen table, trying to push me off of my chair.  Any time she was mad at my step-mom, she took it out on me!  I came home one day and there was cat poop on my bed!  Needless to say, we weren't close and I didn't have any warm and fuzzy feelings toward her.  I never warmed up to any cats they had, until after I got my Nicky.

I moved about 2 hours north of where I grew up to Binghamton, NY for about two to three years. When I ended up on my own, I moved into a very nice trailer park. My trailer was very small, but it was fine for me.  I had asked my landlord about pets and he said that a cat or small dog would be fine, but a small dog would increase my rent, while a cat wouldn't cause an increase.  I decided to wait until I got a bigger place for my dog.  His name would be Trick and I would spoil him or her rotten.

I've always been pretty introverted, but the friends that I do make, I cherish.  My best friend in Binghamton, Debbie, has two sons, Gavin and Brock.  I love all three of them.  However, Nicky is totally Gavin's fault.  It was a rainy day that was worthy of Seattle, Washington, when I heard a knock at my door.  My Dad had installed a peep hole in my front door, so I could see if I wanted to answer.

There was Gavin standing there, with a tiny little grey stripped kitten.  Oh crap, there went my peaceful day...  So I let them into my trailer, not knowing what I had done.  Over the next hour, that sweet little boy did everything in his power to convince me to take this tiny kitten that I really didn't want.  According to Gavin, he had been given the kitten by some random adult male, who didn't want him.  Deb didn't want him and told Gavin to find him a home.  Yes, the kitten was a boy. Now, my family had never had male animals, only female ones.  A male cat scared me. I heard stories of them marking their territory and spraying everything in sight.  None of this mattered, though, because I didn't WANT a cat.  I was waiting to get a bigger apartment, so I could get a dog. Then, the puppy dog eyes started.  Somehow, I ended up with the kitten in my arms.  Gavin was trying his best, telling me how happy the cat was in my arms, like he was born to be there.  I held my ground, reminding him that I wanted a dog, not a kitten.  At the time, a large number of feral cats were living in the woods behind the trailer park.  They were full of ticks and fleas and made my heart hurt to look at them.  So, when Gavin asked me if I wanted the fur baby in my arms to end up that way, I glared at him and told him, of course not, but I wasn't looking for a kitten.  I'm a dog person. That tenacious little shit kept it up until he wore me down enough that I told him that, if he couldn't find the kitten a home with anyone else in a hour, I'd seriously consider it. In a hour, he came back, assuring me that he tried his very best, but the cute kitten was still homeless and, surely I could see what a great Mom I'd be to him.  **sigh**  I have no idea what that boy did during that hour, but I'm positive he wasn't looking for a home for that kitten!  Honestly, I looked at the kitten and prayed he didn't have fleas...

That led to a trip to the pet store, while Nicky was closed off in the bathroom.  Since I was adopting him, I had to name him, so his full name is Nicholas Spencer. Nicholas after Nick Carter from the Backstreet Boys and Spencer after Spencer Smith from Panic! at the Disco.  Shut up.  Y'all are lucky he wasn't named Lance after Lance Bass from *NSYNC.  My car at the time, a sweet Subaru Forester, was named Lance.  Just shut up, ok?  I'm a fan girl. I warned you in the first post...

Where was I?  Oh yeah.  About $50 later, I had everything I'd need, including flea shampoo (just in case). While he didn't have fleas, the vet bills for his shots and neutering, almost put me in shock. Cats are almost as expensive as dogs with vet bills!  Oh the horror!  My vet commented on how great his fur looked and asked me what I was feeding him.  I guess she didn't expect me to tell her Purina kitten chow.  Her eyes got really big and she made a bit of a choked noise.  Oops?  He still loves his Purina indoor cat formula and his fur is still so pretty.

It wasn't until after I got him neutered that I slowly started to fall in love with the bugger.  I set him on the bed while I was using the computer.  The little goof managed to stumble to the edge of the bed and fall off, where he promptly moved like a drunken sailor over to me.  I couldn't hold back my laughter as I picked him up and set him on my lap.  As I pet him and he started purring, I felt my heart start to melt a bit.  I decided to take him to my parents' house with me for my next once a month trip home.

The nicest way to say this is that Nicky hates vehicles more than anything I could ever have imagined.  I had to put one hand of fingers into his travel box, just so he wouldn't cry so much.  It got worse when we got to my parents' house,  I slept on the couch in the parlor.  It closed off with a regular door and a set of glass french doors that slid opened and closed.  Simply put, my parents dogs scared the crap out of him through those french doors.  After a few trips home with me, his vet advised me to leave him at home.  He was so stressed out that he had started to pull out his own fur...

A few days before we were moving back to PA, I heard a series of very loud thumps in the middle of the night.  After almost ten minutes of it, I yelled at him and turned the bedroom light on,  I scared both him and the mouse that he was throwing into the closet doors.  The mouse used the time to try and escape.  I screamed when I found it on moving day.

My mother has started to let me know that she wants grandchildren.  I keep reminding her that, having just turned 40 with no relationship in sight, she just needs to settle for having a grand cat. Nicky did get a very nice Christmas stocking from her.

My Dad has three dogs right now: Ebony, a black lab mix, that has an understanding about peaceful co-existence with Nicky, Carah Mia, a black lab mix that has the same peaceful co-existence theory with my baby, and then Molly, a yellow lab, that Nicky hates.  To be fair, even though my cat is even more introverted than I am, Molly dug herself her own grave.  Dad likes to bring Molly to my house while he's doing home improvement work.  One day, I caught Molly with Nicky's whole HEAD in her mouth.  I saved him, but Nicky hates Molly because she tried to eat him.  As much as Nicky hates Molly, she loves Dad even more.  My Dad is not a cat person, but he tries for me.  One day, he was playing a bit rough with Molly and she was growling and barking.  Nicky came barreling into the room and hissed and drove Molly back. No one messes with his grandpa!

I can't remember what my life was like without kitty cuddles and love.  I know I can't have a dog of my own while Nicky is here, unless it was a very special dog, but that doesn't bother me anymore.  I think if I got a tattoo, it would be a cat paw, because somehow, despite my best efforts, he has slowly won me over and claimed a large piece of my heart as his own.

Recently, I was extremely sick with a stomach virus.  I was so bad, that I took several days off of work.  I received more cuddles and love from him than I can ever explain.  He was attached to my side as much as he could, the poor boy.

He never fails to greet me in the kitchen after work,  Most nights, I can hear him headbutting the kitchen door, trying to get out to see me before I get in the kitchen.  Tonight, the next door neighbor stopped me to give me a serving of soup.  There was my cat in the kitchen window, meowing at the top of his lungs, trying to get me to hurry up and get in the house already, because he missed me.

The question remains, who rescued who?  I think we rescued each other.