I’m starting out this one by choosing order via my purposeful Oxford comma. Nerd drama aside, after remembering all the rejection Sadie suffered at my parents’ house, I want to write about Sadie’s kitty friends waiting for her back home.
We moved into our first apartment together about halfway through our year-long engagement and it was a cute 1-bedroom on the second floor of a small building. We had a balcony overlooking a lovely alley that amplified the energetic sounds of our upstairs neighbor’s enthusiastic dating activities (as if the incessant thumping through our ceiling wasn’t enough – close a window, people!!!). Good things that came from this access to fresh urban air include our first garden grown in several small pots, friendly chats with our across-the-alley neighbor who also had a balcony garden, and Sadie meeting the cats next door.
I don’t remember whether we met our human neighbor first or if Sadie saw her cats first. I know that the apartment next door was empty when we first moved in during the winter and I don’t think it was occupied until the spring. In any case, our baby fell in love with her babies and that’s how it started.
The cats officially met in the hallway after the humans discussed across our balconies whether that might be a good idea. We’d been watching them just looking at each other for weeks and they seemed keen to make contact. So, we agreed on some safety measures and went for it. The hallway meeting went really well, which led to many cat play dates.
When we saw our neighbor on her balcony, we’d ask if she wanted to send her boys over or if we could send Sadie to her place. She’d do the same if she knew we were home. Sadie also stayed with her when we went on our honeymoon and our neighbor reported that they all had a wonderful time together.
The big downside to our cats becoming friends was that the boys started climbing over between the balconies. It made all of us very nervous, so my husband installed a trellis on our balcony AND on her balcony to discourage it. That didn’t really work, so then he asked our neighbor if she’d be okay with him installing a cat walkway. He ended up using a 6 or 7 foot long piece of tubing scrap that his work let him take home. It was just big enough for the cats, super sturdy, and firmly secured. From then on, we’d just open the balcony slider whenever we wanted visitors…or let’s be real, whenever a cat told us we needed to open the door.
They’d race back and forth between balconies and tumble all over the place together. It was fun to watch and even more fun to chat with our neighbor about it. Our plant neighbor from across the alley even noticed and also enjoyed watching them play.
It was sad when we moved out at the end of the year, but we tried to stay in touch to arrange more kitty play dates. Zack and Max even visited our new apartment once, but that was pretty much it. We were in another part of town, I went back to school at night (while working full-time), and our neighbor had her own serious issues she was dealing with.
Our plant neighbor, our cat neighbor, and Sadie’s boyfriends made our corner of that apartment building that much nicer. I’m grateful Sadie had Zack and Max in her life and that she had such a fun first year with us (ignoring the terrible week at my parents’ house). It’s always nice to have friendly neighbors and it’s always better to have more cats.
Girly Details 