Well, I thought it was Mimi travelled many ks returning to his first home (I’d love to believe this sort of pet-returning-home stories), but it was not. It all started from last Saturday night, the first night after we came back from China. I noticed a cat standing in front of our front door when I was sending my neighbour off to home. All I did was to try to be friendly, as I always do, to those wandering dogs and cats.
To be honest, I have never had successful experience to “seduce” any wandering cats back home, but this cat, he did. He walked in, checking around with his nose, and then picked a place to sit down comfortably.
He is a fit, beautiful and very pleasant boy, quiet yet active. Believe it or not, he looks incredibly similar as Mimi . As I haven’t seen Mimi for at least 14 months, I really have no idea if Mimi could grow up to look like this. I checked his whole body and made a comparison to some old photos of Mimi. They are so alike, except the colour of eyes and the size of white part on his rear legs, but frankly I still can’t be 100% sure he is not Mimi.
Now this cat comes back like 100 times a day. It could be any time during the day or night . The biggest mystery is “has he got an owner?” If he has an owner, how come he wanders around day and night? If he hasn’t got one, how could he manage to find a shelter for a night sleep in such a freezing winter?
Well, what am I supposed to think? The only thing I can do is to treat him like Mimi’s brother, paying off on him for what I owe Mimi before. I started to buy some cat food to feed him, but not to try to lock him in the house. If he means to be here, he will always find a way back, but if he belongs to someone else, there’s no way I can keep him not running away. However, my husband and I did mention that one day, we might take him to Vet to see if he’s got a microchip to find out who his owner is.
Now, this cat, comes and goes as he likes. He eats and drinks here, and he plays with us when we have time. Sometimes he waited outside the door in the early morning when we were off to work, sometimes he walked in after the sunset and the darkness began to fall. I don’t own him, not his body, neither his heart.
In one afternoon when I was watching him sitting comfortably next to our screen door facing outside, I was thinking, “What the hell, I must have started another phase of relationship of my pet ownership……” He’s a bit like a teenager kid, who comes home to ask money, food, clothes, a good sleep in his/her bedroom, but just never talks to you or shares anything with you. You watch him/her come and go as if this was a hotel to him/her, but you don’t know what s/he was thinking.
When this happens, it just breaks your heart, doesn’t it? But you are still unable to resist…you still care. I wondered how my mom put up with me when I was at that funny stage. But I started to figure out which ways she could possibly use to get over this sort of feelings and move on.
Sometimes, you have to learn to live with “letting it be”.
Ox tails were purchased from Coles at lunch time at about the price of $6.70/k. When most of people just walked away and didn’t even notice their existance, I found it very appealing to a person who has cravings for a pot of warm, hearty soup.
It couldn’t be more easier to make this. Just throw in onion, coleslaw, carrot, potato, slightly cooked tomato and stew for about 1 hour 45 minutes in low to medium heat. Comparing to the first light version of the ox tail soup, this one is more suitable for your winter stomach.
