My Story

In January 2003, I was living in a huge apartment complex in San Antonio, Texas. It was the coldest winter in the town's history. I had two indoor-only cats: Tilda, a wise, easy-going, and talkative tabby, and her sister, Katka. Kitty Katka is a pampered and petted drama queen who has more in common with a badly-behaved Hollywood trust-fund brat than other tortoiseshell kitties. Her silky body weighed 10 pounds. She would turn 10 that April.

Katka slipped outside at 11:00 one evening. The night was freezing, and there was no activity in the parking lots. She vanished into the black night.

She was recovered almost three months later. She weighed only 4 pounds.

Her ego remained intact.

Here she sits at the vet on the first day of her recovery. Her fur is missing in great patches, and her ears are curled with dehydration. She looks extremely pleased with herself, convinced that even though she is not at her best, no other cat can hold a candle against her.

A year later her full recovery is captured in this photo shoot. She can't decide where to look -- she knows she should focus on the camera, but she's caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror, and like Narcissus, she is bewitched.

Katka's three-month odyssey was the worst time of my life. I tried everything in my efforts to bring her home: ranging from the logical and scientific to the absolutely ludicrous and bizarre. I remember thinking "what kind of cosmic bunny hole have I fallen into here. . .?" when a Wicca was cleaning my apartment one evening with a smudge stick and speaking to Katka through magic runes. (Not that there's anything wrong with that!)

Anyway, long story short, I learned to trap cats - a little TOO well, in fact - word got out on the street pretty quickly that some insane woman had cages with tasty fish and nice comfy temporary shelters. It wasn't long before I was getting Repeat Offenders. I was lost in a sea of strays. I swear I'd approach the traps and they'd be snoozing. One night I trapped my worst moocher, chased him off, and then after I had started to walk away after baiting and setting the trap, I saw him heading right back into it. If you want the tuna, I will give you the tuna! Stay out of the trap!

Unfortunately, my own cat would NOT be trapped. I have always known she is a stubborn, contrary, and suspicious kitty, but the entire situation was just ridiculous. I think she saw the traps and she said to herself, "I don't know, there's just something not right here..." I went insane with frustration. My trap count was up to 18 separate kitties (not counting Repeat Offenders) and one extremely well-behaved possum.

I knew where she was the whole time. There were drainage pipes that ran under my apartment complex, and she was living in them with a pack of strays, using the pipes like a subway, and eating out of a dumpster - and what was left over from the food I left out for her near the dumpster. Unfortunately, Katka waited until everyone had eaten first before she went in - every cat, raccoon, possum, and who knows what else - but by the time they were all through, she had the leftovers. No matter how much food I left out, the homeless animals would attack all of it - and Katka was left to slowly starve to death.

So I came up with new idea - if you can't get the kitty, get the kitty to come to you. That's when I came up with the idea for the “Kitty Buffet”. Soon I found myself feeding every cat in the neighborhood (as well as an occasional schnauzer who got away from his owner on walks). I'd like to say that all of this worked - the traps, the buffet, every embarrassing thing I attempted. I know it would have worked - had I been dealing with a cat who was not paranoid, delusional, and psychotic. In the end, it was the kindness of a stranger who brought her back to me.

Katka weighed ten pounds when she slipped out of my apartment that January night - and when she was returned to me, she weighed four. She had lost so much weight that her collar had slipped under one leg like a long purse strap, and for days it had cut through her skin and left gaping wounds. Another slice had been taken out of her left flank. She was crippled and starving when she was forced to leave the safety of her drains. She left the pipes and the dumpster where she had been living and wandered deep behind my neighborhood onto someone's private property.

On that property was a man named Gino. Gino saw Katka, thought she was a stray, and thought he could give her a life - until he saw how badly she was injured. Then he saw her license tangled up with her collar - which led to an emergency trip to his vet.

It was about 10:00 in the morning when I answered the phone.

"Do you know a cat named 'Katka'?"

My hands started shaking and I don't know if I managed a syllable as an answer.

"We have her."

I ran from my house so fast I almost forgot to bring my own car.

Since the night Katka disappeared, my life has taken a turn for the surreal. My job was gone, I had to move, and everything I was doing in my life previously to my nightmare paled in comparison. All I had before disintegrated because I spent every waking hour in front of the computer, trying to help so many owners just like me, driven relentlessly by the memory of the searing pain I had felt when Katka was gone - and the certainty that I could make it go away if I could save others.

(Katka would like me to add here that it doesn't matter how paranoid, delusional, and psychotic anyone thinks she is. She knows she's so gorgeous that the world would not spin on its axis without her.)

(My other cat Tilda told Katka that she needs to get over herself and she's bloody well lucky she didn't get her furry tail-end whupped the second she came home.)

Sisters Again

Jenne Mundy