Well, Squeaky was sort of planned. Jakey was devastated after Gryphon had to be put down.
Very lonely. I knew that I physically could not handle another GSD, and there really isn't any other breed of dog for me.
I knew Jakey was good with other cats as he had "office priveledges" at the boarding kennel he and Gryphon stayed at, and ran free in the office with the other office cats when boarded.
I was visiting the shelter I volunteered at (I do breed ID and kitten socialization) and "Yolanda" a 4 year old female tabby with a defective, chronically infected eye, that I had noted as one of the "shy ones" who had been there for months, literally ran up my leg, up my chest, threw her paws around my neck, and licked me on the nose!
I eventually came out of shock long enough to scratch her for a bit before peeling her off of me and putting her back in her cage. Once in her cage, she commenced crying and reaching her paws through the bars to grab at my hands and shirt sleeves.
Basically, Squeaky adopted me! I walked out into the front office and said, I have to go home and get a carrier, Yolanda has decided to come home with me!
She and Jakey bonded almost instantly and were inseperable. When Jakey died last year of kidney failure secondary to kidney cancer, Squeaky was at loose ends.
I knew I'd be getting another cat, but was already planning on moving back South, and had pretty much decided to wait until after the move to bring in a new family member.
I was down at the shelter and was asked to ID a cat that had come in a few days ago. He was unhandlable, "mean", and so filthy that I literally smelled him before I found his cage.
They were calling him "Tommy. I was able to ID him as a Maine Coon Cat which was corroborated by mgmt. who had his litter slip, and noted that he was matted to the skin and caked in his own waste.
The first order of business was to get that filthy, matted coat off of him. I put on a pair of leather gauntlets, got Tommy, who it turned out was not mean, but terrified, out of the cage, carried him, howling and snarling, all the way into the "treatment room", and proceeded, with the help of two other volunteers, to shave him bald and then bathe him.
"Naked" he was revealed to be an underweight, senior red or cream pet quality Coonie, with the potential to be a magnificent animal if we could ever get him to the point of tolerating being touched.
We got Tommy dried off and lined his cage with towels and blankets and put him back into it.
I thought about him all night and all morning. I couldn't get him out of my mind. I had rehabbed abused Maine Coons before, but Tommy, at nearly 11 years of age, was the oldest.
I also knew, that as fearful as he was, and at his age, he was very unlikely to get adopted, Around 9AM the next morning, I made my decision and showed up with Jakey's old oversized carrier...
That began a long saga. For 3 weeks. Thomas hid. After a few days, he began venturing out to eat and use the litterpan at night.
On rare occasions, I caught a glimpse of him as he slunk from room to room. Progress was measured by the times I could place a dish of food or bowl of water near him without getting hissed or growled at.
Then, one day, I placed a plate of food in the bathroom cabinet, and he didn't back away from me snarling. I left my hand next to the food dish and after a few minutes, Tommy lowered his head, ears still flattened, and sniffed my hand. I removed my had slowly and left him to his meal.
Later that night,I was on the computer and I heard a funny muttering noise. I looked down to see "Tommy", now renamed "Thomas" as befit the dignity of a senior cat, sitting about 5 feet away from me, just staring intently at me.
I lowered my left hand from the keyboard and let it dangle, never meeting Thomas' eyes. About twenty minutes later, I felt the brush of tickly whiskers and then the touch of a cold nose. That was followed in short order by the softness of the fur on Thomas' cheeks as he rubbed first one and then the other against my hand.
Still without meeting Thomas' eyes, I began to talk to him. Nonsense, more of the same nonsense that I'd spouted during feeding times and time spent outside hidey-holes trying to get him used to my presence, scent, and the sound of my voice.
The breakthrough moment was interrupted by Squeaky, who was not taking at all kindly to having her home invaded by this stranger, charging up, hissing and spitting, and making a credible attempt at slapping Thomas' ears off. He bolted, and I didn't see him again....until...around six am, when I woke up because my right arm had gone numb, only to realize that Thomas had crawled into bed with me, crawled under the blankets, and was sleeping plastered against my right arm and chest.
Things have only gone uphill from there. Squeaky and Thomas have FINALLY settled into a peaceful coexistence punctuated by the occasional playful or affectionate moment.
It's been a long haul, but oh so worth it. Both Squeaky and Thomas have baggage from their pasts. I'm still finding out things about them, even after 4 years in Squeaky's case.
But no-one would've wanted little Yolanda with her leaky/nasty eye until she decided she wanted me (and I hated the name "Yolanda"), and no one would've wanted a big, unhandleable longhaired cat that it took a set of bite guantlets to get out of a cage
