Cat plant. Extremely rare. Grows well in night time under the artificial light of street lamps.
I dedicate today’s letter to Victoria. The most resourceful, enduringly strong and intelligent cat on our street. We’ve been meeting since spring.
According to my observations, she will soon have her third litter this year. When she was taking care of her first one, no other cat was allowed or dared to approach the palm tree on the corner, where I was delivering food and water to the breastfeeding cat mother. I’ve also seen battle wounds on her. She’s been through it all. But her instinct is unprecedented, if anyone, then Victoria knows how to survive in a cruel concrete jungle.
Despite knowing each other for quite along time, Vicky is still feral, she doesn’t want to be caressed. “No need for that, thanks. Just leave the food there, then you can go,” she always tells me with a look in her eyes, but her tail is always welcoming when she approaches me.
Last week, however, the street boss lady invented a new strategy. Late in the evening, she now waits for me downstairs in front of our apartment building. She settles on the cold soil in a decorative pot and falls asleep sometimes. When I show up with my well known bag, she meows to greet me and walks with me to the first corner where a few other cats come for the meal as well. After I’m done making piles of food, Vicky reaches for one of them, and sometimes she decides to bother other cats, if she is in the mood to bully them for the sake of her feline territorial reputation.
That’s not new.
Her next step is what surprised me.
When I fill the water bowl and see that everyone is having dinner in peace, I head over to the other end of the street where another cat gang is waiting for me. Sometimes they come half way go meet me.
What about Victoria? She comes with me. For “seconds”.
Luckily I have enough for everyone, and Vicky most probably knows that I can’t refuse her another serving.
Yesterday something new happened again. When I started pouring cat food out of the container, she came so close that her head deliberately rubbed my hand for the first time ever.
Then she stepped back and looked at me as if to say “See how nice I am? Pour a little bigger pile for me.”
Clever girl.