Cats and Neighbors

As many of you know, my neighbors have nicely asked me to keep our cats inside.  This is a really big challenge because before we got our cats they were indoor/outdoor cats, and based on their behaviors since we've adopted them I am guessing they were mostly outdoor cats.  They are very motivated to go outside, much more motivated than I am to bother to keep them in.  And they are excellent escape artists.

Its a perfect storm.  I don't care about them enough to keep them inside, they are determined to go outside, and our neighbors hate them going outside.  I don't blame them for hating the cats either.  They are a retired couple who has invested a lot of time, money, and energy into a beautiful garden so they can sit on their patio and watch the birds come to the sanctuary they have created for them.  They don't want my cats scaring off the birds.  And I can appreciate that.  But not enough to do battle with the cats all day every day.

Today Jason opened the door to take something outside and both cats bolted through the door.  My hands were full of screaming, hungry baby and Jason was busy and stressed out.  Not in any shape to deal with the screaming, hungry baby that had a deathgrip on her milk source.  So neither of us were inclined to go hunting down the two cats and gave up on getting them back inside.

I nurse my screaming cherub until she is calm enough to go outside.  Then we head out armed with gardening gloves and a kneeling pad to clean the leaves out of the flower bed.  We are out there ten minutes of so, wading through the goopy guck and worms, and I look over at my neighbor's gorgeous yard. 

While looking over, I noticed my neighbor lady is sitting on her porch.  Or she was.  When I look over, she has a book and she is violently throwing it over and over again at the glass window of her porch.

As I've said before, they are an older couple and very sweet.  I am always afraid they will get sick and die and drug dealers will buy their house, corrupt my children, and drive down the property value of our house.  So I consider myself very invested in making sure they haven't devopled dementia, alzheimers, or have gone crazy. 

So I stood up, watching her repeatedly, violently throwing this book at her window.  I said to the baby, "What on Earth is she doing?" 

Once I stood up, I could see that she was looking at the ground.  I also looked at the ground and saw the fatter, dumber of my cats, Yoshimi, was on the ground hissing at my neighbor's cat on the other side of the window. 

I groaned, knowing this was going to be embarassing. 

Carrying the baby on one hip, I came over into my neighbor's yard and tried calling the cat.  Which looked at  me and laid down.  I talked to her very softly, moving slowly so I wouldn't scare her.  Once I got close enough, I grabbed her and threw her on my other hip.  Of course she started hissing and clawing me trying to get away.  I had to hold her a little further from me so she wouldn't claw the baby at the same time. 

I think the neighbor lady was a little embarassed I'd seen her throwing a book at the window, so she yelled to me, "They were having a confrontation!"  (Through the glass, where no one could have been hurt).  I said, I know, I'm really sorry.  We are really trying to keep them inside."

Then I carried the yowling, clawing mass of black fur into the house, acting as a barrier between the baby and the cat.  I got to the door and I yelled to Jason to come open the door.  He arrived, terribly put out that he had been interrupted to open a door.  I told him we need to fix the screens on the porch to keep the cats in.  I will let you know what happens.