Those of you may remember back in the early days of Beauty Cafe when we had our kitty, Sadie. I adopted Sadie back in 1986 at the Downey Animal Control . Sadie relocated with us to Texas in 1992 and passed on in 2006. We had some good times with that little girl and she definitely used up all her 9 lives in her adventures before passing on at 20 years of age. Sadie had a long, healthy, and happy life and she left us with so many wonderful memories of her mischievous ways.
Ten years would pass before I found myself thinking about having another cat in my life. Strangest thing about dreams... one night I had a dream about having a black cat. The very next day a big fluffy black cat started hanging our our house. No, we didn't take that kitty in, she belongs to someone up the hill... but it definitely got my one track mind working and within a couple of weeks (and our landlords blessing) we were stalking the Downey Animal Control website. After all, it totally made sense to go back to where we found Sadie (right)?
So Alannah, Julian and I wandered the through the kennel building looking for our special kitten. I guess my heart was searching for "Sadie" and she just wasn't to be found anywhere. Then Alannah spotted a wee little kitten in the back of a kennel all by itself. We arranged to have a meet and greet with the little girl. Oh my goodness, it had been so long, so very long since I'd held a little kitten I forgot all about how precious and cute and cuddly they were. Then I got nervous... and scared and we put her back in the kennel. I called Chris and we had a family discussion about it. He asked all the right questions. I had come looking for Sadie and could I commit and love another kitty. It was too much for me to think about and so we decided to take a break and go have lunch at Johnny Reb's where we used to go when Alannah was Julian's age.
Heading back north on the 710 I had a slight anxiety attack, do we, don't we, what do we do? I've also read that more black cats are euthanized over other color cats. So, at the very last minute we took the exit and I said "If she's still there, it was meant to be." There she was in the back of her cage just waiting to rescue us!!
The ASPCA was onsite that day picking up the tab for all cat adoptions! We had her microchipped and brought her home. Alannah came up with the name which anyone who knows us, knows what huge fans we are of IndyCar racing so we didn't give a second thought to the name.
I'm really glad that I took that time out to make sure that we were doing this for all the right reasons. I so get the "Who Rescued Who" saying about adopting animals. I definitely feel that this little girl has already managed to wiggle her way into all of our hearts. She is not Sadie, she will never be Sadie, she will be Indy and she will be her own kitty and together we will all make new memories and I'm sure I'll be sharing a few on here from time to time.
Indy is on InstaGram @IndyTheShopCat and you can follow her/our adventures on there.
Note to potential adopters: even if an animal is not up for adoption yet, you can still visit the animal you are interested in and put in a "Commit to Adopt" so that you can return on the day the animal is available.
