Despite the cold and snow, Tippy insisted that she was going out this morning. She waited in the front hall, yowling, and then, when I opened the door, she fearlessly pushed ahead of our black lab mix and went out into the world – or at least onto the porch. She is a tiny 12-year-old calico who has no business spending much time outdoors when it’s -5C (23F), but she didn’t care. She had plans.
I didn’t see her when I got back from walking the dog, but I was pretty sure I knew where she was, so I didn’t worry until it got close to time for our family to leave for work and school. Then, I texted the neighbours who live a few doors down.
Tippy loves this family. She hangs out with them and their two daughters quite a lot. When all our children were little, she used to follow first our boys and then their girls to the bus stop. Now she just seems to enjoy the extra love.
A few minutes after our first exchange, they texted again.
Which is how I found myself tromping through the snow to our neighbour’s house when I should have been on my way to work. Two workers were sitting in a pickup truck in the driveway. They glanced at me, but didn’t seem to think much of my early morning visit. When I got inside, Tippy was refusing to leave, so I had to take off my boots and head upstairs to help catch her.
Once we had her, I went back downstairs and tried to slip on my boots while holding a squirming calico- but there really is no way to slip on good winter boots and there’s certainly no way to do it while wrangling a cat – so my neighbour tried to help me out by crouching down to help me get my feet in. At this point, a few construction workers poked their heads out from the bathroom they were working on to see what all the screeching and laughing was about.
I imagine they saw something like this, except with more snow and a squirmier cat:
Within seconds the workers were laughing, too. I handed Tippy to my neighbour, jammed my feet in my boots, and grabbed our now-irate cat by the scruff of her neck to head out the door. There, the two men were still sitting in the pickup. Now, however, they were decidedly staring – I was disheveled, my boots really only half on, carrying a twisting, yowling, tiny calico up the driveway, through the snow, back to our house at 8:30 in the morning. I could hear them laughing as I made it to the sidewalk.
Tippy was extremely unimpressed with my rescue mission and raced up the stairs as soon as I dropped her inside the door. Now running late, I grabbed my backpack and my lunch and scooted to the minivan. I made it to work on time, but only just. And Tippy? When I got home, the little rascal tried to go outside again!
Here she is in her normal cuddly glory:
Persistence and Pedagogy 
What a cat! They certainly can have a mind of their own. One time my daughter wasn’t available when her cat had a vet appointment. We had to reschedule because I couldn’t catch her. Have you ever read Six Dinner Sid? A picture book about a cat who loved his neighbors, too.
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I looooved this so much! I’ll send this slice to my mom. I grew up with 2 cats that I absolutely adore, my family and I are big fans of felines. Their personalities are hilarious and sometimes they can get so dramatic!
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I wish I was this cat…two families, two cuddly houses. I miss having a cat,
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I can never pass up a cat post! The pics of Tippy at the end were a perfect reward at the end of the story.
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I love the wild adventure of Tippy! For a very long time, we had a neighbor cat who made rounds. We would find him at our back door, pretending he had not been fed in YEARS, and we would bring him some food. After the day we came home and found him curled up asleep on our sofa (How did he get in? We never found out!), we met all of our neighbors when we went around with pictures and asked if anyone knew him. Turned out, Pickles lived across the street and three doors down, and had quite the route of houses he claimed and extra meals he got. He visited for years, continuing even after his family moved out of state and then back again, until he got very old and then did not go out much. But one day, when he was pushing 20 or so, he suddenly appeared again. We let him in, gave him his bonus meal, pet him, listened to his frail body purr and watched him greet our cats with enthusiasm even as his legs trembled with the effort he had made to visit. We knew he was making one last visit to all the families he had adopted.
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Amanda,
This made me smile more than I have a right to! Tips sounds about as cat as a cat can be. Of course she did t want to go back outside after settling in at the neighbors. She’s a lucky cat to have a home away from home. Our neighbor down the street used to have a dog that would wonder into our house through the garage when Ken left the door open. I found that dog lounging in my house on several occasions. We don’t know most of the critters in our neighborhood well now. Seems to me we should because cats and dogs seem like a good way to bring folks into community.
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What a delightful cat story! Pets, neighbors, mixed media storytelling, observer characters who add humor and body to the story – all the things.
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Your past slices about Tippy came flooding back to my memory as I read about this latest cohabitating adventure. I think this says so much about your community and how you come together. Like your very first post this month.
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Oh Tippy! She is TOO MUCH. I was laughing so hard over these texts with your neighbor. “She’s looking at the door, no she’s refusing to go out”… And then the rescue scene. What a morning! She is so beautiful and so absolutely in charge. Such calico energy!
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I don’t usually tell people to go read my blog, but I knew you would appreciate Tippy’s shenanigans. 🙂
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