A new member of the family
This past weekend, my wife and I went to a nearby Army Corps park to just relax and enjoy each other. It was our first trip in the motorhome since the family trip to Disney I previously wrote about. This trip was to be just the two of us - no pressure, no schedule, no stress. It all went wonderfully well - with one complication.
Shortly after we set up, a cute little white kitty came into the site. I'm a sucker for animals and especially cats. Donna's a cat person, too, so that works well. In fact, we travel with two cats. For several days the kitty stayed in our site and even followed us when we walked the dog or went on our walks around the park. The only way I could get out of the site without her following us was to feed her and then dash out while she was still eating.
Well, you don't have to be a genius to figure out what happened. The kitty wore me down and I wanted to adopt her. Donna is the more logical one when it comes to such things. She gave all the arguments why our four cats (two stay at home) should be enough and the timing wasn't right. I could agree totally with her logic - and I wanted to adopt the kitty any way. Finally, on the third day, we came to an agreement. I would take the kitty to our vet (we were close enough to home that this was only a 30-minute drive in our Saturn toad) and have her checked out. If she did not have any diseases that would harm our other cats, we would keep her.
Long story short, Sugar is now part of our family. She's slowly getting accustomed to the other cats, and they are, by an large, accepting her. The transition has been easier with Sugar than with some of the other cats we have adopted over the years.
The reason I tell this story is it was interesting to me how the discussion went. It was never about who was "right." It was never about "winning." It was about what was going to be best for all the relationships - and if we could manage a sixth player - four cats plus one dog plus the new kitty. The decision was not about my "winning." It was about our common agreement that there was enough love to go around.
Experience in the few days since Sugar came into our home shows we were right. We're still worried about Sugar. She still has some medical problems, just nothing contagious. We hope she will live and be a happy member of our family for a long time to come. But whatever happens, we will both know we made a good decision - and it was our decision. That's the way to keep relationships sound.
2 Comments
Recommended Comments
Please sign in to comment
You will be able to leave a comment after signing in
Sign In Now