Meet Midnight Magic
Happy Friday all. With a lovely 2 hour episode of sleeplessness last night followed by a 5:15 wake up from the lad it took me a little longer to get going this morning. Nevertheless, the second I shifted my attention to writing this blog post, the cat came running in, purring like mad, and installed herself on lap. As she has clearly decided that she is my muse, it only seems fair to tell her story.
The winter before my son turned three was not a great one for his health. It was his first stint in a preschool program and of course he caught everything that came through the doors. After a week of up and down fevers and increasing lethargy I decided to make an urgent care visit to his pediatrician’s office, suspecting we may be dealing with pneumonia. Thanks to the magic of Tylenol and the fact that his actual pediatrician was out, I got completely blown off by the attending physician and was basically told I was a hysterical helicopter parent.
At this time, our post well-child routine was to visit the pet store and look at the animals and my almost three year old begged me to do that on this day. It was the first thing he had really shown interest in for a bit and since his fever was gone and I had just been told by a medical professional that he was fine and I was basically nuts, we went to the pet store.
He made a beeline for the cat cages which seemed, at first, to be empty. I was about to encourage him along to the ferrets when a little black face popped out and gave us a soundless meow. She sat down and looked at us both like, “What took you so long?”
It was almost a month to the day since we had said goodbye to our 18 year old black cat Cerridwyn and I had had no intention of getting another feline anytime soon…until I saw that face and heard a tiny, “Ooooh,” from beside me. The cat just stared and gave another silent meow. Her tag read “Midnight Magic. I year old.”
I knelt down.
“Are we taking her home?”
He grinned and nodded enthusiastically. I took a picture through the glass and sent it to my husband. No words. The response came a few minutes later. “Oh boy. I guess I know what I’m coming home to. :)”
By the time the three of us got back to the house the lad’s fever had spiked again. Within 36 hours of our doctor’s visit we were at the ER in the middle of the night. His fever was 107, his breathing was ragged, and I was trying desperately not to panic. My mama instincts had been correct after all. Pneumonia. Thanks to an amazing ER team were able to go home later that day; adults we knew landed in the hospital with the same strain. The lad did spend over two weeks on bed rest with a heavy duty humidifier and more TV than he had ever watched in his life.
During that time, this little cat, who had been with us for less than two days, never left his side. She laid on the pillow next to him and he would fall asleep stroking her bunny-soft fur. If I got up to leave the room, she would start to follow, realize that would mean leaving him alone, and settle back down to keep watch. She truly was Magic.
She has her quirks. If left to her own devices at night she is quite insistent that we get up with her around 2 am, she is death to houseplants, and occasionally slips outside and tries to attack the chickens when they are free ranging. Otherwise she is truly the best cat I have met. Once the lad was back on his feet he put her through all the usual toddler torture and she has only given him a slight scratch on two well- deserved occasions. When the dogs would run away from his meltdowns, she would come running towards him and rub up against him or just sit beside him in that quiet way of hers until he calmed down. She is still our self-appointed nursemaid if any of us get sick, and, apparently, very devoted to my writing endeavors.
Now if only she could do the editing….
