it's a miracle

Well, I think it is.

Dolly in the picture window.  It's close to a year since our Dolly has sat there in peace.

Dolly in a chair in the front doorway.

It was one year July 2nd when we took Sweetie in. They have not gotten along. Many's the time I thought of posting about it, but my heart wasn't in it.  It has been very hard to see Dolly keeping to herself at the other end of the house (her house!) because she wanted to avoid Sweetie.  A year is a long. time, especially in the short life of a cat.

Sweetie was very well named but Diane warned me "she hisses at other cats - she doesn't like them". She comes from a houseful of cats and people and never really liked it. She's gotten used to Henry by now, but he's totally non-threatening anyway.  After an initial period of Dolly trying to make nice with Sweetie, it didn't work, she just gave up, and overreacted, hissing and running off whenever she appeared. We've wondered if she wasn't confusing Sweetie with Tootsie, who's also a tortie, and is terribly aggressive. But Dolly never acted like this with her - could it be that she was just fed up? (Who understands cats, anyway?)

Up on the shelf between kitchen and living room! All these (not very good, I know) pictures taken the same day!

My aunt passed away, and the funeral was Friday. We came home and everything was changed. There was Dolly: on the kitchen table, in the kitchen window, on the shelf, in the living room window, lying on the rug. As calm as could be. She will still hiss at Sweetie, but she isn't afraid of her anymore. The anxiety is almost gone.  What happened, so suddenly?

Is it due to all my prayers? (you can bet I prayed - what else was there to do? Who can reason with a cat? Anyway, it was breaking my heart that Dolly was apart from us much of the time.) Did she suddenly realize that Sweetie, like herself, doesn't really want trouble? I'm guessing that Sweetie figured out early on that hissing worked in a houseful of cats, but the vet commented that for an outdoor cat she seems to have kept out of trouble, because there aren't scars and marks on her. And I give her credit that she has never encroached on the area that Dolly was keeping to - it's funny that now she can sometimes be found in the spare room, but Dolly isn't interested in going there anymore.

I don't know what happened so suddenly to give Dolly this peace, but Thank God For It.

I'm flabbergasted. And so grateful.