The Immortal Cat

Theo (the cat) came into my life as a result of guilt. I didn’t want a cat. Didn’t need a cat. I had just bought a house in Marietta after my divorce. I had lost my Dad a few months prior to buying the house. Buying the house was a huge step in moving on with my life after several difficult and emotionally draining years.

My track record with cats had not been good. My first pet was a cat. His name was Tiger, because he looked like a tiger. Genius name calling. We had him when I was around 6 or 7, but he ran away after a trip to the vet. My roommate in college kept his mom’s cat with us one semester and that cat hated me. It would never let me pet it and in the middle of the night, he would lay across my neck just to scare the hell out of me. 0 for 2.

One day, Chelsey (then 8 years old) and I returned to the house after running an errand. As we sat in the driveway, I looked over at her and she was crying. After I asked her what was wrong, she pulled herself together and said “we don’t have any pets at your house daddy.” Oh shit, was my first thought. I didn’t need a pet. I was barely taking care of myself. But how do you say “no” to a crying 8-year old little girl? The next thing I know were are pulling into the Humane Society and looking at this full-grown, long-haired cat that she loved. $65.00 later, we are bringing “Theo” to our house. Little did I know at the time that I had just made an 18+ year commitment!

Yes. Theo is still with us. We really don’t know how old he is. He was full-grown when we got him 18 years ago. So, he has got to be at least 20 years old. I am beginning to wonder if this cat is going to out live me. Every morning when I walk downstairs to make coffee, I expect to find him lifeless in the corner somewhere, but he keeps, keeping on.

It is funny to think about what this cat has seen. When I just had the kids a couple evenings a week and every other weekend, Theo was my main companion many evenings. He would sit on the couch with me as I watched TV or read. I was his only option for attention.

When the kids were there, he would get lots of attention from Chelsey in particular and he didn’t have much use for me. He would stay in her room with her.

He has seen the growth of our family with Nikki and the girls entering our lives and he moved to Williamstown with us. He went from a house with just me in it a lot of the time, to a house full of people. He has seen our kids grow up and leave and now he gets terrorized by two little grandsons. A lot has changed since I left the Humane Society after an episode of guilt and weakness.

Last week, I thought Theo had finally met his maker. Nikki and I were preparing to travel to the Seneca Rocks region for a 3-day video shoot, when we realized we had not seen the cat all day. On our back porch we found a pile of cat fur and an end table was knocked over. Apparently, Theo had gotten outside the day before. As an indoor cat with no front claws and fear of his own shadow, we were pretty sure that he was not coming back. We left town and prepared to call Lea after she returned home from work to give her the news. Lea loves the cat the most and is especially emotional when it comes to matters of the heart. I let Nikki make the call.

Lots of tears later, Lea when out looking for Theo with no luck. As we silently thought about no more cat hair, no more cleaning out the litter box, no more getting woken up at 6:00 am by a whining cat, we got ready for bed and a busy next day of shooting video. As we were just about to fall asleep, a text came with the photo below.

Theo was back. Over 24 hours in the wild and he was back on the porch. They say cats have nine lives…he’s got to be on ten or eleven.