New Kitty-Cat

Our old cat, Juno, died last month. It was difficult for the family, particularly my youngest daughter, who was the cat's favorite. Juno spent most of her time in my daughter's room, sitting on her lap, laying right next to her head while she slept, and so forth. So, when the cat was gone, my daughter was pretty upset. 

A few weeks after the cat had died, my daughter came downstairs looking a little rough, and my wife said, "Are you okay? You look like you've been crying."

"Oh, I was just thinking about Juno," was her response.

We have another cat, named Jupiter, but she's not nearly as cuddly as Juno was for my daughter...or anyone else. 

She likes to play and run around, but hates being picked up, held, or even to sit next to somebody. That may change when she gets a little older, we only got her a couple of years ago, but for now, that's her temperament. 

My wife thought a good plan would be to get a new kitten to replace Juno. After all, she says, we're a two cat household now, not a one cat household. I wasn't so sure that we needed to remain a two cat household. I like Jupiter a lot, and am happy with her, but I like my daughter even more, and I'm willing to do whatever I can to make her happy, so I agreed.

On Sunday, we got the new cat from Somebody who lives out in Spring. It's a pretty cute cat, but it is painfully skittish. It's so nervous that you can't as much as clear your throat without sending it running, and reaching toward it to pet it is the most scary thing it can imagine. It spent the first several days hiding out under our bed. We gave up and put its bed under there, and it laid on the bed under the bed for the first 24 hours or so.

I wasn't even totally sure what it looked like. When we got it from the woman, it had been in the cat carrier, and wouldn't come out. We had to dig it out and then drop it into our cat carrier to take it with us. As soon as we opened our carrier, it fled under the bed. My son got a few pictures while he was sitting next to the bed, reaching in under to pet her.

He had to use the flash for the picture, because the cat wouldn't come out of the protective dark under the bed.

It wasn't until Monday morning that we were finally able to coax the cat out with a toy that interested her too much to turn down.

She stayed right at the bed's edge, though, and retreated back under it if anything made her nervous at all.

While I was at work on Monday, my daughter and son managed to get the cat to feel a little bit more secure. They decided on the name as well. They were torn between the name Nyx and Freya, thinking both were cute, and wanting to see which went better with the cat itself. It is now decided that the cat will be called Freya.

Days in now, and she's a little more adventurous, but not a whole lot. She still spends most of her time hiding, and we often have to turn our couch upside down and dig her out of the space she's climbed up inside of to hide. Somehow she manages not to just hide underneath, but actually goes up inside the back of the couch. It's a nightmare.

We've tried introducing the two cats, but it hasn't gone very well. Jupiter growls and hisses when she sees the Freya. Apparently, that's the standard, and you have to keep them apart to where they can see each other but not interact with each other until they get used to the idea of the other cat and then you can bring them together. 

I hope it happens. For two years with Jupiter, Juno did nothing but hiss at her any time the two were near each other. I hoped that Jupiter wouldn't act that way because of her past experience, but no, I guess cats are just that way. 

All I can say so far, is that I prefer Jupiter. One of the main reasons I didn't like Juno was because of how much of a scaredy-cat she was. She ran from me every time she saw me as if I had kicked her over and over. That really rankled after a while. My wife insisted it was because I was just the loudest person in the house, and it made the cat nervous. I just hated getting treated like a monster without even getting the joy of being a monster to deserve the treatment.

Now, we've got another skittish cat. My wife keeps saying that I just need to be patient, coax her out, give her time, and so on, but I don't have the time to do all that. I've got all sorts of crap taking up my time, and I can't spend it all sitting around waiting for a cat to feel comfortable enough to come out from under the bed long enough to be touched.

I fear that this cat will always dislike and fear me, and maybe it's my fault, but I'm not sure if I care enough to change that.