Mariah died August 14th.

Mariah was this cat my sister and I rescued by accident. I came home from work one night and there she was in the tree meowing. She seemed so happy to see humans. "Hoominns! I'm saved!"

When she jumped down from the tree, that's when we noticed she was pregnant. She had three kittens that we named Ivan, Erik and Amelia. Well, more like my sister named them. We would feed her on the porch. The kittens would toddle after mom, see us, and run away. Mariah would give them a look like "Why are you running? Hoomins are our friends."

She had obviously belonged to someone. I remember taking ads out in the paper, but no one ever called. 

At that time there was this man who would poison cats, so we brought her and the kittens inside. Her kittens at that time were a bit feral, and we had trouble catching them. So my sis would say to Mariah, "Mama. Mama, where kitten?" And she would point out their hiding places to us.

We kept for a bit in a large cage in the garage with her kittens. Once a day, my sis and I would clean out the cage. We took turns; one would clean out the cage, the other would mind the kittens. We would put them in a laundry basket, and they would try to escape. She would simply stroll by when they would cry to her ("Mama! Halp! Rescue us!") and find a nice spot to start cleaning herself.

Feral Friends helped us adopt out her kittens. My mom ended up wanting to keep her. So we did.

She had to have one eye removed in the spring of 2002. I remember that because I had signed up for drawing class after being laid off about 12/21/2001. I made her eye trouble a project. I don't know where I have the paintings or sketches I have of the changes to her left eye. I should pull them out and complete that project.

She was 13 years old. 

PS she spent the last few years disabled. Thanks to her poor vision, she walked off something she should not have, and hurt her back. First time she recovered pretty well. The next time she did not. She would drag her backside around. I had to have her super groomed and changed her litter to a non clumping type. It would clump up on her tail and back legs.