I get to stay home today! (Except for my normal Saturday stuff.) Last Saturday I went to Br'er Coon, and the Saturday before that I went to Apricot's shelter to meet him. I am so relieved I can stay home today. And I wondered how Apricot was going to react to all this.
He's getting to know that when the alarm goes off, I have to be awake, and thus will respond to inquiries. I don't remember him meowing last night, but this morning, right after the alarm went off the first time (the first time I'm allowed to snooze button it), I heard a determined, tiny mew from the floor at the side of the bed, on the hideyhole side.
This is the first time I've heard him meow when I'm actually awake. It appears to take some effort for him to get "loud" because compared to the asleep meows, I definitely heard this one, but it was still such a tiny mew for his size.
Making the noise one makes moving under covers, I leaned over the edge of the bed, rather expecting him to retreat to the hideyhole (it being so convenient and all) due to the covers noises. Nope, he was right there, sitting and waiting for me to tell him it was okay to come up on the bed. He used the stairs to get up on the bed as my head was in the way to jump up, even though I moved back to give him room.
And then he spent the time with me on the bed that I spend before the last alarm goes off (the one that means, get up now or you'll be late for work). I mostly played on the phone and he mostly hung out on the bed, sometimes against me, sometimes just washing or lying still. Very interesting behavior from little scared Apricot, I thought.
I went for my walk then. It's why I get up at the same time on the weekends that I do during the week. No, I don't have to go to work, but it gets too hot to walk later, and this way I don't have to change my alarms or mess with the clocks, and honestly, I do better with a consistent routine. So I get up and go for a walk at the same time seven days a week. Even though on Sunday I go back to bed afterwards.
When I got back in, I went to say hi to Apricot and the headboard hideyhole was empty. Huh? I checked behind the washer and dryer, even though they'd been running so the likelihood of him being there was low. This means I walked past him twice, because he was in the cubby of the cat tree in the living room! I knew he liked it last night!
 |
| The perfect spot |
I was even more pleased because, ah ha, now I can at least vacuum the bedroom and spare my poor allergies. Taking the vacuum cleaner out of the closet where it lives in the middle of the house, I explained what it was and what I was going to do. He can see me there from the cubby so I wanted him to know what was going on. Then I took the vacuum cleaner into the bedroom, shut the door, and cleaned the bedroom.
Afterwards I went out into the living room to see what had transpired. He was still in the cubby but he was a little wide-eyed and scared. I eased into petting him, letting him sniff me first, and talked and petted till he relaxed. Then I closed myself into the pink room with the vacuum cleaner and made loud roaring noises, cleaned half the hallway up to the point where he might be barely able to see the vacuum, and into the purple room where I shut that door and cleaned the room.
 |
| The other side of the cubby, after vacuuming ceased |
And hopefully all of this will sink in, and Apricot will realize that the noise may be loud and scary, but nothing bad is happening to him or any of his stuff. I'm very careful to put his toys back where I moved them from if I have to vacuum underneath them. If he heard loud roaring noises and the toy bird disappeared, you can see how he might come to the wrong conclusion. Even if he found the bird somewhere else later.
After all of this I played on the computer at the computer desk (still in the living room) and while I did that, he eventually got down and roamed around some. Even going into the kitchen. I haven't yet followed him in there ... wonder what he does in there? I don't hear any bumps which would mean jumping on the counters ...
Later ... HA! He went into the bedroom and under the headboard for (apparently) an afternoon nap. I went in and explained I was going to vacuum the rest of the living room ("remember the loud roaring noise?") and if he didn't mind I was going to shut the door. And that is what I did. So now my house is all clean, and my allergies are grateful.
When I finished I put everything away and opened the bedroom door and told him that it was over for the next two weeks. As I was reassuring him that it was safe now, he came out from under the headboard (oops, hadn't meant to disturb his nap) so, since I was tired now, I asked if he wanted to go up on the bed (yes please, and up he went) and then I pulled the pillow out from under the covers (this action was looked upon askance but he didn't leave) and curled up on the bed next to him.
We cat-napped together. Eventually my hand ended up against his back, and then later he rolled over and my hand was against his chest. My eyes were closed and I was drifting so I was a bit startled when he suddenly wrapped his paws around my hand. I opened my eyes and his were tight-shut, his paws around my hand, fast asleep. Aw!
Sunday I got up, walked, and came back and went back to bed. This provoked quite some confusion from Apricot, who didn't want me to go back to bed and wanted played with. He mewed at me and milled around my feet (when I was on the floor). This is new.
When I woke up and went to find him, he was under the couch in the tv room. I think he may have gone there in a huff, honestly. He was completely under the side I didn't have reclined, and I couldn't reach any of him. So I reclined that side very slowly and very carefully, to give him plenty of time to move out of reach of the mechanisms. It worked; he moved into the center and then, since both sides were now open, he left completely.
But then he kind of settled down and wanted petted and stuff. This whole afternoon he's been very friendly. He's changed from the cat who left in a hurry if I was up and walking to a cat who keeps winding around between my feet when he wants something (usually for me to sit down and pet him).
I thought perhaps he'd be ready for some active play, and got out Da Bird. This is a rather expensive wand toy I bought in preparation for the kittens. It retracts and stores in a pouch, and has four guinea fowl feathers on the end of an elastic string. Da Bird was received with much enthusiasm. He chased it and occasionally, when I let it lie still on the floor long enough, even caught it. You're always supposed to let them "catch" the toy when you're going to put it away, to properly end the chase. Do you have any idea how hard it is to let Apricot catch a toy that he's both tantalized with and slightly scared of?
And for desert after supper, he came in to the kitchen with me. (I made a microwave thing that had to cool down, so I'd taken some laundry into the bedroom and was going back to the kitchen when I was joined by Apricot.) I illustrated that he was allowed to sit on the chairs.
He got up on one of the chairs and then put front paws on the table. I said "no, not the table" gently and guided his paws off the table, gently but persistently. He didn't act afraid, just like, "okay" and dropped back down and then off the chair. I find this interesting. Perhaps he's actually going to get the concept that quickly?
Most of the afternoon he spent snoozing in the cubby and watching me go back and forth as I read and watched some tv and did the few chores I had left.
So two weeks and he's now demanding petting and playtime, getting entangled underfoot, and expressing displeasure at my sleeping time choices. This is a far cry from the terrified cat who cowered under the headboard and wouldn't come out for anything!
No comments:
Post a Comment