Saffron the Cat

Last Tuesday (15th Nov) I went to the ASPCA on a bit of a whim and ended up going home with a cat named Saffron. Jon and I had been talking about adopting a cat for a while now, but with me having no job, the extra cost of needing to support another living being seemed a little too high for us to afford. That being said though, it's moot now since Saffron came home almost a week ago (oops!).

During the taxi ride home from the ASPCA, Saffron kept meowing so pitifully in his hard carrier, that the taxi driver and I felt so bad for it and I thought about him as the poorest thing in the world. When we got home and the carrier was finally opened however, out came the boldest cat that I've ever met. He spent literally 0 seconds in the carrier and practically sprang out when we opened the door, and proceeded to investigate every single square inch of our tiny flat, jumping up and down all our tables and counters. That first night, we also began to realise that we would have trouble shooing him off our bed as he would snarl at us at us when we tried to get him off. So since then we've resorted to keeping the door closed, much to Saffron's chagrin.

Jon and I have quickly fallen in love with Saffron. He's an old boy at 14 years old, and spends most of his time sleeping. When he's awake however, he still likes running around the flat at top speeds and climbing all over things. He loves being scratched under the chin and has a particularly violent and strong angry tail wag that makes thudding noises. He also has no problems showing his displeasure by snarling. Yesterday he went into the bathroom when I was trying to clean up the mess made from all the kitty litter and proceeded to roll around and freak out on the litter that was on the ground, and when I tried to wipe him down with pet wipes afterwards he got upset with me. So we ended up spending the remainder of last night displeased with each other.

Adopting Saffron has brought up a whole barrage of other questions for Jon and me, and another dimension to our relationship. We now talk about things entailing shared responsibilities and differences in approaches towards taking care of the cat. We wonder what this means for us, when we become parents one day.

In the mean time however, we enjoy our time with Saffron as much as we can. He could live for another year or even another five years, either way because of his age, we know that we should treasure every moment with this persnickety fellow.