On Oct 16, 7:39*pm, Cory wrote:
My grandfather lived on a farm my entire life. *In 1995, he passed away.. *
My mother and father went to the farmstead to clean, gather, pack, et
al., after his death. *Because the property was a farm, there were
NUMEROUS farm cats... a lot of which were inbred, I believe.

Anyway, the question, after Mom and Dad gathered and inventoried, etc.,
my grandfather's belongings, became one of "well, what the hey are we
going to do with all of these cats????". *A lot of them were surrendered
to the Humane Society, and a fair number of cats who were older and less
physically stable, were put to sleep... except for one in particular.

Holly.

Holly was a completely white-haired, blue-eyed kitty who was probably
around 3 months old when my grandfather died. *AIUI, because she had
white fur and blue eyes, that fact alone explained why she was also
deaf. *She couldn't hear a word anyone ever said. *My mom was adamant
that she not be put to sleep, so she and my father adopted her.

My parents and I, at the time, were not getting along all that well, so
it would be maybe a year or two before I came to their house and met
Holly.

Holly, probably because of her deafness, had a habit of meowing any *
time she felt like it... and loudly, to boot (to me, her meowing was
more like caterwauling, BID).

The very first time Holly and I were alone together, she got a little
uneasy, I think, because Mom and Dad were not in her house and instead,
there was me, this stranger whom Holly had never seen up until 2-3 days
before, and Holly didn't know that they'd left until she woke up from a
nap (which she took often!). *So, Holly comes out to the living room,
looks around, goes downstairs, and starts meowing... LOUDLY. *She scared
the snot out of me. *She came back upstairs, looked at me, and sauntered
down the hallway, STILL meowing. *Now, because Holly's deaf, she's not
going to hear me when I'm talking to her. *Thus, I just had to wait
until my folks got home to figure out what was wrong with her.

"Um, I think something's wrong with your cat. *She's been roaming around
the house meowing AT THE TOP OF HER LUNGS. *Is she in heat?"

"Oh, she's fine,", says my Mom, "she just does that... ALL the time."

"Why???"

"Well, we have a feeling that she's trying to find other cats or her
littermates or something along those lines."

"Oh..."

So... for the next 13 years, Holly continued to talk to us anytime she
felt like it. *She would never, ever hear us talk back to her, but she
felt comforted, I guess, by the fact that we would never abandon her
when she DID talk to us.

Holly was a good cat. *She had her favorites... her most favorite
person, I think, was her daddy (my father)... and she wasn't too fond of
the other cats (nor they of her at times)... but she was one of those
unique, one-of-a-kind kitties, and she is missed.

--- Unca Cory


Dat wazza furry nys tribyewt Unca Cory. Fantu fur sharin Holly'z
storee wif us.

DaRennieKidz