There’s this weird division in the world where people think they have to be either dog or cat lovers, without any room for both. It’s just not the case. For the longest time I thought I was a dog person, and then I lived with cats. The cats won me over. Turns out, they’re not so bad after all.
But even as a dog person, I would never be cruel to cats. Cruelty to any animal is just awful. That’s why we’re all so happy that things worked out well for poor Athena.
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This is Athena. She’s a perfectly lovely, friendly semi-outdoor cat who would roam her neighborhood in search of food and attention, and go back home every night.
Athena had one house on her route that she particularly enjoyed visiting. She would watch the birds in his yard, let him pet her, wait on his porch for him to get home from work, and maybe get a bit of food from this kind neighbor.
That is, until her owners got two new dogs, bringing the household total to four.
Although she was pregnant, Athena was kicked out of her house in favor the new additions. Looking for help, she turned to the kind neighbor she enjoyed visiting on her daily journeys.
Athena took to sleeping under that kind neighbor’s porch, and one day soon after he woke up to a surprise: Athena and her three fresh kittens.
He couldn’t get at them to help them out right away, but a few weeks later, he spotted Athena and her kittens out for a romp in the yard.
He took a picture and sent it to his daughter, an animal lover who works with local rescue groups and is something of a cat whisperer.
With her help, he managed to secure all three kittens and bring them into his house.
Which was a tricky proposition, considering he already had two senior cats. And although the kittens were wary, Athena was more than happy to come indoors and make herself at home.
The kind neighbor’s daughter managed to get the kittens spayed/neutered, vaccinated, and dewormed at a discount through her rescue connections.
And, slowly but surely, the kittens got accustomed to their new surroundings. They even picked up their own names: Artemis, Apollo, and Zeus.
The next thing they had to do was figure out what to do with all of the new felines in the house.
The neighbor’s daughter already had five cats of her own, so taking in four more was simply out of the question. Initially, her dad was open to keeping Athena and putting the kittens up for adoption, but she “went into full on guilt trip mode” to convince him to take in the whole kitty family.
And so, rather than breaking up the family, they became members of the existing family.
Even the older cats accepted them all in, and they don’t mind looking out for the kittens one bit. It’s almost like Athena was always meant to be there. At the very least, she couldn’t have picked a better new home for herself.
h/t The Dodo
