Today the plumber came over after saying he would be here for about 10 days in a row and never calling to say, yeah, I’m not gonna make it… When he finally showed up, Josh let him in and didn’t shut the front door. The screen wasn’t latched, and well, in the 60 seconds that it was open, Apple, my snotty but beloved white kitty escaped.

I’m not ashamed to admit that on more than one occasion I’ve looked at the kitties for adoption on the SPCA’s site and secretly wished my sweet but sometimes annoying cats would die so I could adopt more kitties in need. I didn’t really mean it, though. And now my cat, who cries and cries the second you pick her up, or even look at her, is in the cold somewhere and I can hardly handle myself.

This woman I worked with once had a particularly close bond to her animals and was absent at work for DAYS after her elderly dog had to be put down. In the darkness of her office, she cried to me about that pup’s last moments and how she had him cremated.

I’m not that nutso. But part me wants to cry because when I was little, my gray tabby cat, Sylvia, left home one day and never came back.

We adopted her from a friend who woke up one morning and noticed a pregnant and sick stray was about to give birth under her air conditioner. From that litter came a gray furball we named Sylvia and her calico furball sister, April. We adopted them both. Less than a week after we got them (at 7-8 weeks), their mother died of advanced FIV.

I remember giving them baths, watching them chase bugs. Their personalities were separate and distinct. April was more aloof, poised, and lazy. Sylvia was slim, active and bold. She always wanted to jump up on the kitchen counter tops, the dining room table and anywhere my mother didn’t want her to be. She would look up at the dining room table - and Mom would say, “NO!” She would crane her head around and sass back, “Meow!” This could go on, back and forth for a while.

The day she went missing, April started acting differently. She was sad, meowing sullenly around the house and sitting in the window sills. She eventually became extremely lovey, which had not been part of her personality before Sylvia’s disappearance.

I remember all this, and my heart hurts for Apple. K-K is acting weird, like something around here is missing. I am hoping that despite her lack of claws, Apple return unharmed. But she is ignorant and unaware of cars and big mean dogs and how much colder it will be tonight than in our warm bed.

And I will have to cuddle a pillow instead.

UPDATE: Our prodigal cat has returned. After a four hour outing, she mewed pitifully at the door, probably freezing to death. She has yet to give us a sufficient explanation for her absence, but we’ve accepted her back with open arms.