If you live in the country, you know there’s a low-life kind of person who decides s/he is tired of her pet and figures the best thing to do is drive out in the country and throw it out the window.  We hope that the healthy black and white house cat that showed up on our front porch wandered away from his house and that the owner is looking for him.

In spite of the myth that everyone in the country is hoping for a young barn cat,  those who throw cats out the window know the odds are the cat isn’t going to live. Many get run over. Others are attacked by dogs, coyotes, and hawks. Or go hungry because they grew up in a warm house and are used to Purina Cat Chow and 9Lives rather than hunting for field mice.

If we were “cat people” in between cats, we’d let this one in the house because it’s too darned cold out there for an indoor cat. But, we have too elderly female cats and don’t think introducing a young male cat into the household is safe; plus, it might have fleas, and one of our cats is allergic to flea medications. So we took a large carton and made a door in the end of it and filled it with towels. The cat seems to like it. We’ve also been putting out food.

Since my wife grew up on this property and has people on her Facebook profile who’ve been around here forever, she posted a picture of the cat, saying she figured it was lost or needed a new home. So far, no response. She’ll do that again after the holidays. We hope an owner shows up and tells us they’ve been looking for the cat for weeks but never thought it would wander this far from the house.

That’s what we want. We’re keeping our fingers crossed (figuratively speaking). It’s healthy, clean, and appears to have been well cared for. If it were my cat, I’d be driving 24/7 until I found it.

—Malcolm

Since all four novels in my Florida Folk Magic Series feature a cat, it’s easy to tell that I’m a cat person.