On Fri, 10 Mar 2017 13:34:35 -0500, "Robert Catt" wrote:

This reminds me of little Mooch. She was a stray who showed up in our
backyard one day, starving. I fed her, and after a year or so she moved
permanently onto our veranda. For a long time she wouldn't let us near her.
But with time, she began to trust us, and soon she was over to us demanding
that her back be petted. Like Koala, she'd come a long way baby!

Yep, it's a slow process when a cat for whatever other reason has spent time in
an environment where it came to regard humans as something they're better off
avoiding. All you can do is keep giving them your love, and if you're consistent
in the way you treat them, they do seem to respond to that sooner or later.

I've always thought it somewhat of an oddity that felines - who, except for
lions, tend to hunt alone when in the wild - nevertheless seem to have that
natural need to interact. That works in our favor, provided that we are patient
enough to keep earning kitty's trust a little at a time.

Just yesterday after a couple of sessions of playing with Minnie here - and she
does like to play a bit rough - she jumped up on my lap and allowed me to hold
her while she was upside down in my arms like you hold a baby, while gently
rubbing her under her chin - and while she was laying there with her paws on
either side of my face licking my nose, it occurred to me that trying to do that
would have gotten me scratched or bitten back when I first got her in October.
That was a first. After about 15 seconds I put her down - making sure I didn't
overdo it, because that was a first for her letting me hold her like that, and
so I wanted to make sure I stopped before her tolerance reached its end. It
wasn't so much to keep from getting my face scratched as to build trust. She
hasn't been a lap cat thus far - but I'm working on it. grin

John D. Kasupski
Niagara Falls, NY