Meow!

Toby joined our little family in October of 2006. We lived in our tiny little cottage in the middle of a big field, and we had a bit of a problem with field mice. For Kevin's birthday, we went and picked out a tiny black kitten and brought him home. Kevin named him October, and we call him Toby for short.

When we brought him home, he was the size of two of my fists with my pinkie sticking up as his tiny kitten tail. He fit inside Kevin's sweatshirt pocket, and when he got scared, he would run under a coffee table. I remember the day he was big enough that he ran to the coffee table and thunk! He didn't fit under it anymore.

When Kevin went on his internship in Hong Kong, Toby was my little b

uddy. I'd come home from work, and he was meowing and happy to see me. I'd talk to him as I worked in the kitchen or around the house, and he'd meow back to me.

He likes to snuggle with me when I'm sleeping. When a small kitten, he'd weightlessly pad across our bed and make himself comfortable in my hair that spread across my pillow. Now that he's

huge, it's a little bit painful when he steps across me, and he curls up on my shoulder more than my head--which is good because I enjoy breathing.

(warning, unflattering picture)

I had several miscarriages before having Penny, and during each one, I'd snuggle Toby like the baby I didn't have. I know he's a cat, but he filled a need for me, and for a few years he was my baby and my child. I needed someone small to love, and he filled that void perfectly.

A couple years ago, I remember hearing a cat meowing LOUDLY. I was in the back room, and it sounded like Toby was in the kitchen having a major fit about something. But Toby was right next to me making no noise at all. It turns out that there was a little fuzzball kitten stuck in a tree outside in our neighbor's yard. Kevin went out to investigate, as did several of our neighbors. A little while later, we had another kitten. This one we named Howie.

He is a good friend and little brother for Toby. They entertain and fight with each other, and they keep each other in shape. They run around the house together, and when they're not fighting, they lick each other's faces clean and sometimes even snuggle together to nap.

As a matter of fact, we have Howie to blame for Penny's birthday being a week before her due date. We let him play outside our apartment while we went for a walk on a Saturday. By the tim

e we came home, he was nowhere to be seen. I love the little fuzzball, and in my extra hormonal state (38 weeks pregnant), I was very upset by his being lost.

I roamed around our neighborhood a few times that Saturday looking for him, alternately weeping and calling for him. Then on Sunday, I was really upset and couldn't stop crying, so I left church early to go look for him. I walked around the neighborhood in every spare minute I found, calling for him and looking everywhere I could think of.

We put up a few signs around the neighborhood, but then it rained and ruined them. So that Monday, I went to Kinko's and spent a good chunk of money making full color flyers for our Howie. We walked around our block that Monday evening putting up flyers, and I had painful contractions every so often during that walk. When we got back to our apartment, I peered off our balcony and saw that fuzzy little stinker over in the next parking lot over. I toddled down the stairs and ran (yes, ran!) over to scoop him up.

And then Penny was born a few long hours later.

I didn't grow up with cats, and I never really understood how people could get attached to their pets. But somehow it happened to me.