The barn cat.

I don't believe Gatsby will ever be a true barn cat. He is on the porch all day long now, unless it's over 100 degrees and then he goes underneath the back deck. He must have found a nice cool spot under there because when he comes out, he doesn't feel hot to the touch.

Gatsby stays as close to us as he can, either sleeping on the porch itself, or on one of the chairs, and one night when I woke up in the middle of the morning, Gatsby was sound asleep in one of the porch chairs outside the TV room window. Last night, as I was sitting in a chair sewing still more puffs for handmade pillows, there was Gatsby, his green eyes staring at me thru the window. He doesn't meow..... he just stares. My husband says he wants to be part of the family. Well, he already is, but he's just outside.

Not in the barn, though. I don't think I've even seen him walk into the barn.... not even when I walk Gracie up the hill and Gatsby is right there with us. That cat will stay close to Gracie all the way up the hill, and all the way down. He doesn't make a detour into the barn to see if there are field mice in there. For all we know, the barn is filled with mice because we don't have an actual barn cat to keep the mice away. For all intents and purposes, Gatsby may just be an inside cat who happens to stay outside.

And a possessive outside cat at that. I cannot walk three steps without Gatsby running to my feet and melting himself down onto my ankles with the rest of his body curled up around my leg. I have tried keeping to the two steps to the right, three steps to the left rhythm, but Gatsby keeps changing the sequence and the only way to get from Point A to Point B at times is to just pick him up and carry him right along with me.

My husband says I am teaching him that he will get picked up every time he rubs his head on my ankles. I told my husband that all I'm doing is trying to avoid a broken leg if I fall over this cat because he intends on keeping himself so close to me as I'm walking. He not only follows me, but he will follow my husband into the backyard when he waters the plants there, and he follows our dog all over the property, and he will watch us doing chores-- Gatsby is the supervisor.

The first time I held Gatsby, his entire body stiffened, which made me think that he hadn't ever been held before. The second time I picked him up, he was a little more relaxed in my arms. And now.... Gatsby turns into a furry mass of Jell-O and just stays in my arms and looks at the view as we walk. Those green eyes of his..... they look at me as intensely as AngelBoy's blue eyes used to star right thru me.

Cats. Inside cats. Outside cats. Barn cats. Whatever you call them, I get attached to them all. I remember the first couple of days when we found Gatsby outside..... I told my husband that of course I would feed this poor starving cat, but I wasn't going to get attached to him. At that very minute, my husband gave me a look that said Yeah, right.