Nine Lives Ever since my kids were toddlers, my little family named the one Tiger because he was striped similar has always had cats as pets. I was figuring it up the to a tiger, and my five-year-old son named the other other day and counted 10 cats by name that we’ve Michael after the name of his best friend at the time. owned in the past 25 years. That’s right, 10 cats – (Remember that name Michael, because he’s the starting with a little kitten we named Sheba and end- main focus of this article.) ing with a stray that came to our back door over a A few years later, my kids were playing in a field year ago that we named Ginger. Poor little Ginger was near our home and discovered a litter of three abanthe nicest cat we’ve ever owned, but she had feline doned kittens. Thus, the inclusion of Skunky, Midleukemia and we had her euthanized a few months night and Bikini to the Lane family cat farm! Bikini ago. So, this is the first time in 26 years that there (so named because of markings on her belly that hasn’t been a cat at the Lane house. It’s the first time in 26 years that we’ve not had to buy cat food, or go to the vet, or clean up cat vomit, or remove a bird carcass from the back porch, or wash paw prints off our car windshield, or listen to the hacking sound of a cat coughing up a fur ball. Oh, and I forgot to mention, it’s also the first time in 26 years that we’ve not had a kitty cuddle on the couch, or a tender brush of a cat tail against our legs, or the sound of a contented purr in our ear after feeding time. I sure do miss them! Ten cats in 25 years! You’d think I would forget a few of the names after so many years, but I remember each one distinctly. As I mentioned before, Sheba was our very first cat. She was a kitten when we first got her, and my kids immediately fell in love with her. Sheba eventually had her own litter of kittens. We kept one of the kittens and named her Nala (after the Lion King character). Nala also had a litter of kittens and we kept two of her babies – Tiger and Michael. My seven-year-old daughter Bree (pictured here) was one of five abandoned kittens adopted by the Lane family over the years. August 2021
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