A Writer's Cats

by Sylvia Engdahl

What would a writer do without a warm fur blanket between forearms and keyboard, soft paws reaching out from the desk, a large curled-up paperweight on the very stack of papers needed for the work at hand? Might it not be possible to accomplish more without that kind of "help?" It might, but then again, if no purring companion were present, the house might seem too empty to work in. I have always felt that to me, it would.

But time changes all things. At the end of 2016 I became physically disabled and had to give up my house and move to an assisted living facility. So my last remaining cat Dumbledore, then 15 years old, had to go back to the organization from which I got him, S.A.R.A., the Shelter Animal Resource Alliance of Eugene, Oregon. It's a nice place for cats--they live in a thrift shop operated by volunteers to support the organization, and are free to explore and be petted by customers. I was told that he was very happy there, and in fact I suspect he was happier than he had been with me in recent years; after his brother Gandalf died he had seemed bored and lonely much of the time. He liked people and my home was just too quiet. He lived at S.A.R.A. for almost two years and then, to the sorrow of his loving caregivers, he had to be euthanized because of untreatable health problems. Though I still miss him, I'm glad that he had a chance to enjoy his remaining years.

Here are Gandalf and his brother Dumbledore the week I got them in September 2002, when they were 6 months old. They were rescued from the pound by S.A.R.A. and raised in a foster home. I fell in love with them when I first saw them. They were indoor-only cats, shown here inside my screened porch. Both were very affectionate and when they were small it was quite a challenge to use the computer with one in my lap and the other on my shoulder! Once fully grown, neither would fit in my lap without a supporting arm, meaning I had to use the keyboard one-handed.

I didn't care for the names they had at the shelter, so I gave them the names of two wise wizards: Gandalf the White (from Lord of the Rings) and Dumbledore (from the Harry Potter books), informally known as Gandalf and Dory. When young Gandalf was pure white except for face and tail markings -- though as he grew, his back darkened to cream and then orange.

Dumbledore is an old word for bumblebee; J. K. Rowling has said that it "seemed to suit the headmaster, because one of his passions is music and I imagined him walking around humming to himself." It also seemed to suit someone with a very loud purr! These seemed elaborate names for such small kitties, but appropriate for the large, dignified cats the two would become when fully grown. And they did grow large! As an adult Gandalf weighed 19 pounds (the vet said he wasn't too fat) and was very handsome. Dumbledore was only a little lighter.

For many more pictures of Dumbledore, Gandalf, and my other cats, visit my Pinterest page at pinterest.com/sylviaengdahl.

My mother and I got Hesper and Phoebus--who was always called Sunny--when they were 8 weeks old. (We gave them astronomical names: Phoebus for the sun and Hesper for the evening star.) At first we each loved and cuddled both, but the two soon decided between them who owned which person! Hesper wanted me to hold him, and would no longer go to my mother, while Sunny was the opposite. Sunny would not sit in my lap, though he was constantly in Mother's, for nearly six years. Then, the night Mother died in the hospital, he jumped on my bed for the first time since kittenhood, and thereafter sat with me regularly. Somehow he knew, even before she failed to come home to him.

Though Hesper and Sunny liked each other, Hesper didn't pay much attention to Sunny--he only wanted to be with me. So when Sunny died at age 10, I didn't think he'd miss him. To my surprise he cried constantly after Sunny was gone, and would not let me work for a single instant. I hadn't planned to get a new kitten, but that changed my mind--and when Marigold came, he got back to his usual contented self. For the first few days, though, he was terrified of her, a tiny kitten, because she hissed at him the first time his great big cat face came near hers--he ran and hid under the bed! After that, he generally ignored her, hissing only when she tried to jump on him or grab his tail.

They became good friends, but I think Marigold was bored; Hesper still wouldn't play with her. She was an indoor-only cat, the first one I'd ever had that I didn't let out, and I fear I made a mistake by not getting a companion of her own age when I got her. I wondered from time to time if I should add a new kitten, but didn't quite dare, because if she didn't like it, our lives would have been miserable! Hesper would have accepted a young one as he accepted her, but Marigold might not have; after Hesper's death she seemed more contented and affectionate as an only cat. My home life was such that I couldn't cope with keeping cats separate even temporarily. Yet having once adopted another, I could never have given it away--cats were members of the family to me. And we were always a happy family.

I can't imagine a home without a cat. I've always had one--and sometimes two--except for a few years in my late teens when we weren't settled anywhere. Not counting those of my childhood or a black cat I had for a short time while away from home, I have had seven cats, serially except for Hesper and my last two, spanning all of my adult life. They frame my memories of where we lived and what was going on in our lives.

Butterscotch was the anchor of my mobile youth; he made 5 intercity moves with us--traveling by car, plane, even train--and lived in 10 different houses during his 14 years, besides which I lived in 6 other places from which I visited. The December he died marked a new phase of my life, for it was when I began writing Enchantress from the Stars; I remember being so crushed by grief that to occupy my mind I started a project I didn't think could come to anything, but which turned out to be Enchantress.

After another 14 years, when Pussywillow died and we got the two kittens, a new phase was again starting; I had just acquired my first home computer and my mother, then 84, was beginning to feel the effects of old age. Hesper was born the year my last YA novel came out, and his last month coincided with the reissue of my trilogy; thus his life precisely spanned the period when I wasn't publishing.

During the time I had Gandalf and Dumbledore I was yet again in a new phase of life, working as a freelance editor, writing new novels that I had never expected to be inspired for, and producing ebooks. I knew they would probably be my last cats even before I became disabled, for if I'd still had my home when Dumbledore died, I wouldn't have dared to get another (unless maybe from S.A.R.A., which takes cats from individuals only if they originally came from there). At my age it's unlikely that I'll live another full cat lifetime, and it wouldn't be fair to a young cat to adopt it, knowing that if I got sick or died it would be left homeless. So it would have been even worse than it is now to think I'll never have a cat again.

In the pre-Web era I felt sad that the loving companions who'd shared my homes could be known only to me. But nowadays the Internet is full of cat portraits! There are more pictures of people's cats on the Web than of their human families! So apparently I'm not alone in feeling that each unique "purrsonality" is worthy of admiration and remembrance.

You can see many of my best pictures of them in an album; click on "Cats Who Shared My Homes."