In April 2019, a stray, feral cat that I'd been feeding since July of the year before ended up having her three kittens in the small yard of my apartment neighbor, then the next day moved them over closer to my own backyard. A mama and three kittens. Then, 8 months later, in December of 2019, a half-grown cat with the exact same markings as Mama had been hanging around the front and back of my apartment windows so long that I took her in, too. So I had five cats: Mama Hennessy; her kittens Pete (the only boy), Sasha Susie, and Mini (Solomon Grundy); and then Cinco Beasley. (All are fixed, except for Cinco.)
Things have been perfectly fine among all cats for the past 4 years. The addition of Cinco 8 months after the birth of the 3 kittens didn't cause any problems: She was/is very sweet, and I've seen her grooming with all of them. She likes to kiss Pete the most, but she's also affectionate with all others, especially Mama.
But a few days ago, Mama Hennessy started attacking Pete viciously. I mean with blood-curdling yowls and Pete's running for his life and hiding out in the spare bedroom, not daring to come out even during feedings. I took food and water into the spare room, and tried to apologize to him...
After two or so days of this aggression on Mama's part, she seemed to calm down. She "let" Pete have dinner with all of them at their usual feeding time without attacking him. But then later on tonight: I was in the spare room (my library) culling and rearranging books on the shelves. Usually, whenever I go in this room, all of the cats come in to check it out, because it's different and interesting to them that I'm in there. This time, everyone stayed put in other rooms, except Mama. She expressed her usual interest, and then, all of a sudden, she yowled and scratched my leg, all the way through my jeans. When I yelped in pain, she ran out of the room and then attacked Pete (who was in a different room) again.
In the 4 years that I've lived with her inside this apartment, she's never, ever attacked me like this. When her uber-aggression first started a couple of days ago with Pete, I first yelled loudly and chased/stomped after her and Pete, thinking that my loud actions would break up whatever their momentary problem was. It did not. I then started using my plant-sprayer with water to spritz Mama whenever she kept chasing and attacking Pete. This seemed to subdue the whole situation a bit. Today (Tuesday), after a loud morning attack incident, was a lot calmer. The calm cats (Sasha, Mini, Cinco) came out of hiding after freaking out earlier. All 5 cats came to me at various times for stroking, etc., though I initially had to go to the spare room to see Pete and bring him food. All 5 cats met in the usual spot for their afternoon feeding without incident.
I thought things had finally calmed down, but then Mama attacked again --- ME --- later in the evening...
All sorts of thoughts running through my head:
First, what in the HELL started all of this? There's been nothing like this for the past 4 years.
Pete is the only boy, and he does sometimes like to chase Sasha Susie, for instance---Sasha will hiss at him, and then sometimes Mama has chased him away from Sasha. (But just "chased"---not the horrible yowling physical attacks of the past couple of days.)
Other much milder cat interactions:
When waiting to be fed, sometimes Sasha bops Cinco on the head (paw with no claws) and Cinco bops her back.
Sometimes Mini and Sasha will wrestle (sans any hissing from Sasha).
Sometimes Mini and Mama will wrestle (Mini always subservient on her back and playful).
Sometimes Pete and Cinco will bop each other on the head. (But Cinco likes Pete the best, and grooms him; the others don't usually groom him.)
Sometimes Mama briefly hisses at Sasha (they're the closest physically, but sometimes Sasha gets too incessantly needy so Mama swats at her)
And Mama IS protective of Sasha whenever Pete chases her. (But he has not been extra-aggressive toward Sasha in the last 2 days.)
At any rate: I feel that my apartment has been a battle zone for the past couple of days. It's tense and depressing! The cats have all been hiding out separately, and not spreading themselves out on my couch cushions to sleep when I go to sleep. They know something's wrong. But I don't know how to fix it. I know that Pete is sometimes a big rough-house, but he's not malicious, and he's done nothing to make Mama so aggressive with him. (Even Sasha, whom Pete usually chases, usually sleeps right next to him---she knows he's not mean like that.) And then this evening, when Mama crossed over from being irritated with Pete to outright attacking and scratching ME for the first time ever...
What is it with Mama Hennessy? There's absolutely no new dynamic in my apartment, for instance. Same me, no new guests, no new anything. Over the past 2 days during all of this, I've had thoughts about "If this doesn't stop, which cat would I get rid of?" My initial thought was Pete... but then, I discovered that he really wasn't causing any of this. Mama Hennessy was always the instigator---don't know why exactly, since she's always been very calm before...
Right now, all five cats are sitting in the same living room within 10 feet of each other. (Not the case for the past 2 days.) Pete is out and about for the first time in 2 days and no longer scared for the moment, though he's looking warily at Mama...
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As of 11/24: Things have deteriorated. Pete now no longer can come into the main room with the others because Mama H. attacks him. I've put a food dish and water dish in the spare bedroom so Pete can at least eat and drink. I try to spend time with him and stroke him during what used to be the usual times per day for all cats: Morning feeding / 2pm feeding / 9pm treats.
Tuesday, November 21, 2023
Cat Trouble
Friday, November 17, 2023
Life Without Lights
Life Without Lights
I hadn’t seen her for two weeks, and when she finally called me, I came right over. She said she had some coke and, I suppose, none of her teenaged friends to do it with this evening, so she called me. I was embarrassingly grateful, and embarrassingly lonely, so I went over.
The evening started out as evenings usually did with her, even as they had back in the three months when we’d lived together the year before. We settled down on her slippery turquoise-and-black fake-leather couch to watch a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie.
This sexy-looking couch had been one thing that initially attracted me to her---I’d never seen such a thing in anyone’s living room (being used to beige and brown and gray cloth while growing up), and it was certainly cool and exotic to me. The action-movie preference, though, was something I had to put up with. I was a young 23-year-old kid, still in college, an English major, and, knowing that she was into S/M, had tried to interest her in, say, “Marat/Sade” --- an intellectual exercise that bored her to death. She liked action movies. Just as in the porn I’d found under her bed featuring buff gay males in gym settings: Naked guys looking like Matt Damon posing in front of lockers wearing nothing but socks.
Yet she was also a lesbian who overtly preferred goth and vampire domination themes (far from her simple, closeted magazine male locker-room scenarios).
On this night that I was invited over: There was nothing
particularly erotic. We knew each other too well. She and I both knew that I
wouldn’t particularly like the Van Damme movie, but that I’d sit there and
watch and then make out with her, and then have sex with her. I was still
interested in being/feeling close to her as a human being, despite our utter lack
of any actual mental or psychological or spiritual closeness at this point. It
was a kind of “watching movie” companionship out of loneliness.
But still! At this point in time, I still was madly in love with her! I was
very happy to be invited over! Even with Van Damme on the VCR. I couldn’t make
any cogent comments about the very dumb film, of course, but I could cuddle up
to her. Oh, but, whoops! At some point two things happened. One: She decided
that the coke wasn’t making her feel great. Was it me, her companion, or was it
the coke? She kept complaining that she didn’t feel anything. And then: She
couldn’t find her lighter. Where was it? I must have taken it…
Because I was so young, and because she had been my very
first lover, I held on for much longer than necessary. We met in 1989, lived
together for 3 months, had sex on occasion up until 2000. Make a great story some day!