Welcome to Thursday Coffee Hour. This is an open topic thread so help yourself to the goodies and sit a spell and let us know what is going on in your life and what is on your mind. Today I am talking about my first cat, Zonker. Zonker was a big cat. He was 3½ feet from nose to tip of tail, 15 inches at the shoulder, and 27 pounds. He was a huge red orange tabby with amber eyes. He was gorgeous and knew it. He didn’t walk he slinked with muscles rippling.
When I first brought Zonker home my Mom looked at him and exclaimed, “I thought you were getting a kitten. He is a half grown teenager.” Actually he was only eight weeks old. If I had taken a good look at those paws I would have realized that he was going to be huge when he grew into them. He was not a sweet natured cat. In fact he was an absolute terror. I was the only one he loved. My family use to kid me that only I would have picked a cat like Zonker to love.
He passed away in 1989 at the age of 17. Unfortunately no one told him about it. My first encounter with him as a ghost came a few days after he died. I was in bed with my young cat, Sasha, when Sasha suddenly sat straight up and was listening hard. I couldn’t hear anything but there was a jolt as if something had jumped on the bed. I turned on the light and there was an indentation on the pillow where Zonker used to sleep. I have seen him and felt him rub up against me several times. A few year's ago I was resting while trying to get rid of the flu when there was a tremendous jolt on the bed. I saw Zonker sitting on the edge of the bed and he looked like he was made out of gray clouds. I could still recognize him and once he had my attention he just faded away. Unlike the Cheshire Cat he didn't leave a grin.
Zonker has followed my on my moves. It was in Denver that I saw him while in bed with the flu. He followed me to Chicago. One morning I was in a long nightgown brushing my teeth when I felt a cat rub against me. The nightgown was moving but there was no cat. My cats at the time, Sasha and Merlin were both asleep on the couch. I never encountered him in Indiana. Yesterday though I was in the kitchen when I felt a cat rub against me. I looked down and you guessed it no cat was there. Merlin was asleep on the couch and Pixie was sleeping in her favorite chair. This morning as I was brushing my teeth I felt a cat rub again. So welcome to North Carolina Zonker, I hope you are happy here.