WHERE IS 'MISTER?'

How come Mister doesn’t purr?  Isn’t that supposed to be one of those automatic responses that defines the feline species? Highly unusual, said my veterinarian. But on that recent visit to the vet, he was filled with praise for Mister – his svelte physique – so sleek and trim for an indoor cat.  He’s clearly running up and down stairs all day, he said.  I felt like such a proud parent as he continued to extoll the virtues of my cat – his healthy teeth (IAMS) and his curiosity. When I discussed how obsessed he seems to be with the outdoors, he said Mister is from the jungle.

Mister is indeed enthralled with the outside world and begs each morning for the “swindow” as I’ve written about on day 2 of the SOL challenge.  We have kept him as an indoor cat, because I fear the potential dangers of the outside world: too many cars, too many scary scenarios lurking out there. But Mister has a past.

We used to let him out in the backyard in the summer.  It seemed close to impossible and just not ethically justifiable to deprive him of the beautiful outside world.  I would garden, and he would frolic. He’d roll around in the grass and chase birds and run halfway up the tree. He’d meander in the brush and try to grab bugs around the bushes. We would make a barbecue and eat dinner outside, and he was thrilled to explore.  

All was joyful until that fateful day in September when we were outside after finishing dinner around dusk, and we didn’t know where he was.  He had always been in our field of vision. But this time, he was nowhere to be found. Mister, Mister! I begged: where are you?  We searched all around the yard and beyond but he was nowhere to be found.  We went inside and assumed he’d be at the door in the morning. 

But Mister was gone – for two weeks and two days!  Over a fortnight!  Every day I would take walks and search under cars and look in open garages and cry out for Mister.  I begged the universe, I beseeched the heavens to return Mister to us.  We put up signs and enlisted the aide of local kids on bicycles, and the neighborhood was on high alert. 

I believed after two weeks that he was gone.  He was 11 months old, and maybe off to live with another family, or perhaps… I started looking at new sofas thinking I no longer had a kitten/cat, and may as well replace the old scratched up sofa. A consolation prize.

And then it was a Sunday, day 16. We had come back from food shopping, and I automatically opened the back door, just in case, and I heard a meow – and there was Mister - at the back door with turquoise collar in tact – and he walked in, as if “What’s the big deal?” We squealed, we cried, we called my daughters… To hug him again was such a gift!

I took him to the vet the next day and he had fleas and had lost a few pounds, but he was well, and back where we needed him to be.  We’ll never know what transpired during those 16 days; just another one of life’s tiny unsolved mysteries...