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I fell for a feline

I had never been much of a cat person until we got Jet.

I had wanted a pug, like what my sister has. I love their cute, wrinkly faces. But I was scared off by the price tag. They can run upwards of $400 if you buy from a reputable breeder. So I figured feline was the way to go, for the time being anyway.

My wife Lana had a cat, a gray tabby named Chancey, for 17 years. He died of cancer in 2004. We had talked about getting another pet since getting married in 2007, but I was in the process of looking for another job at the time. In 2008 I was hired at the New & Record and we moved from Beaumont, Texas to Greensboro.

For her birthday that May, I told Lana I would give her a cat. She just had to pick one.

We checked out several adoption fairs over the next month. Toward the end of June we saw a Feral Cat Assistance Program booth at PetSmart. In a wire cage was a gray tabby kitten with big yellow eyes named Jet. According to the women staffing the booth he and his siblings had been found with their mother at a trailer park. Lana asked if she could hold him. He was serene, didn’t make a fuss when he held him. We just felt a connection and filled out the adoption forms that day.

FCAP paid to get him neutered, and several weeks after we had first seen him he arrived at our apartment.

I think he may have been a canine in a former life. He likes to play fetch. He’ll bite your ankles if you’re walking around without socks. He’ll even make barking noises at the ceiling fan – literally barking noises, not meows. So I guess in that sense it’s like having a little dog around. Except I don’t have to take him outside to go to the bathroom.
 

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