The Story of Delilah the Cat (power up 100%)

Delilah the Cat (for pretty photos only, scroll down)

For our previous residence, Mrs. Cryptigital and I leased a small, old farmhouse a few miles from a medium-small town. Our fenced portion was about four acres with huge pecan trees, surrounded on 3 sides by fields. One was just mown for hay, and the other was a large area planted yearly with field corn. We did have a couple of neighbors, sort of, but while they were close enough to walk to if you really wanted to, they were too far away to have a conversation with, or even to wave to.

We had two pets: Sally, an Orange Tabby we got from a rescue organization, and a dog named Samson, an Australian Shepherd. A female cat with light tortoiseshell fur had been coming around about once a month or so. She was friendly and looked cared-for, so we didn't feed her or invite her in.

This is our only photo of the wandering cat.

Unfortunately Samson (who deserves an article of his own another time) developed some kind of neurological problem. If it got worse, the veterinarian suggested he be euthanized so he wouldn't have to suffer. Samson was beloved for around ten years, so it was a very sad morning, when I took him back to the vet to be put to sleep.

I arrived back home around mid-afternoon, and Mrs. Cryptigital got home from work a few hours later. The sporadically visiting cat had showed up the previous day, and we had decided to put food out for her, just in case she was hungry when she wandered through. I had gone out on the back porch, about to fill a couple of bowls with food and water, when I heard a cat mewing.

Our tortoiseshell friend had never spoken, but I hadn't seen any other cats around. As I tried to figure out where it was coming from, suddenly a little kitten popped up onto the porch, about six weeks old. "Ohhh myyyy," I said out loud. "Who are YOU?" It approached, mewing, as friendly as if it belonged there. The adult cat was nowhere around.

I called Mrs. C to come look. She is far more a cat person than I am, though I like them well enough. The kitten took to her as if they were fast friends and purred loudly as it cuddled against her sweater.

There in the back yard, we wondered with each other about the kitten, found that she was female, and discussed what to do. All the while, the kitten played at our feet, whenever Mrs. C. could stand to put her down, that is. We assumed that the wandering cat was the mother, though we had never seen her pregnant, nor had we heard any mewing at all before. The kitten had some tortoiseshell coloring on her back, but obviously had one or two tabbies in her background as well.

Then a surprising thing happened. While Mrs. C. was holding the kitten we glanced up just as a great horned owl swooped toward us, from across the field, and veered off at the last minute when it realized people were there. They are big! I'm sure it heard the kitten mewing and thought it had found it's dinner for the night. Amazing!

Well, that sealed it. We sure couldn't leave a kitten outside to be an owl meal! Plus, there were coyotes in the area, as well. So the kitten came to live with us and be an inside cat permanently.

The presumed mama cat dropped by only one time later, and we never saw her again. It was almost as if she was scoping out a safe place to leave her kitten, and now she could move on.

She settled right in, and was a great distraction from our mourning about Samson. Nothing like a new kitten in the house to liven things up. Sally didn't care one way or the other, and would just bat her, if she bugged her too much. We called our son to tell him the story, and he said "You HAVE to name her Delilah, I mean, it's the only choice!"

He was right, and Delilah was named. In case anyone is unfamiliar with the reference, there is a famous story in the Hebrew scriptures about Samson and Delilah. Our Delilah is much sweeter than the scriptural one, though, and she showed up at just the right time to help us get over the loss of Samson. We still have her today... with many, many, many images to enjoy, and more taken all the time.

I'll share more of Delilah in another post another time.
Thanks for looking!