Fortitude? No, Tortie 'Tude!

Remembering Fiona.

Fiona, our tortoiseshell cat, left us on Monday of this week.

Torties are supposed to be assertive, and Fiona was that all over from the moment I met her. I was helping a neighbor get some supplies from the local animal shelter (they often carry surplus cat food and such), and Fiona was in a cage in the middle of the lobby in hopes that someone would adopt her. When I made a few noises in her direction, she opened her own cage and came out to follow me around the room.

I called Janice to tell her this funny story, assuming she would talk me out of my urge to reward it—we had three cats already, and it’d been four just a few months ago. Instead, she replied, “We don’t have one in that color yet!”

Fiona soon moved into command of the other cats, and some command of the humans. She was about nine years old when we got her (five years ago), having lost her last owner to natural causes. I don’t know much about that owner, but it’s clear she didn’t get in Fiona’s way much.

Mealtimes became dinner for three. We managed to train Fiona not to try eating from our plates before we were done with them, but there was no training her not to hop up on the table and sit and wait. This supervisory position assured that the plates would be left on the floor for her after our dinner was done and before their trip to the sink and dishwasher.

Maybe not the most sanitary ritual, but I had a hunch we’d miss it after Fiona was gone. (I was right.)

For most of her time with us, she was a flight risk, all too interested in our neighbor's birdhouse as well as the world beyond. I posted to this space about her escape, eventual return, and plans for further outings.

But there was something Fiona loved more than adventure and her independent spirit. Janice called her the most food-motivated animal she’d ever encountered, and I have to agree.

Having a walk-across-the-keyboard kind of cat can be aggravating for a writer. But there’s also something liberating about being near a creature who is so unashamed to express her desires. I began to plan my work day around making sure I had “gooshy cat food” tins close at hand, so I wouldn't have to interrupt my flow too much when she showed up and demanded a meal.

Of course, some animals should not be fed on the schedule they would prefer, no matter how much force of personality they bring to the request. But Fiona was always a skinny thing, so we never refused her, and that probably kept her around longer.

It was when she seemed to lose interest in food that first Janice and then I started to worry, and less than a day after that, we knew it was goodbye. She was feisty pretty much to her last breath, though. As we held her at the end, hooked up to fluids that temporarily alleviated her symptoms, she reached for my shoulder…snagged it with her claws, and tried to pull herself over it so she could romp around the room. Then maybe escape so she could try to catch a bird outside. I doubt the IV drip would've lasted that long, but who knows?

Eat well, Fiona.