I lost Siam and Frosty last year within a few months of each other. Bill passed this February. Then Porche also died unexpectedly in April. I had vowed no more pets because, at this stage of the game, they will most likely outlive me. and then wonder why I am no longer there for them.

And then fate stepped in, bringing me Arlo

,

and Elwood.

In late March I was walking Porche and Cookie when they suddenly ran to the edge of the walk path and were frantically barking, wagging tails, and obviously had cornered something. By the time I got to them, I could see that Porche had treed a black and white cat and Cookie was focused on something she had chased into  a pile of logs. I rescued the small Siamese-looking kitten and could see that the one in the tree wasn.’t coming down. So I took the one Cookie had cornered and both dogs back to the barn. I put the kitten in the barn, shut the door, shut the dogs in the backyard, and went back out to coax the other cat out of the tree.

Well, that wasn’t going to happen. I called Weldon Smith to see if he might be able to bring over one of the BCEC bucket trucks to rescue the cat. He said sure, but why not wait and see if it would come down on its own by morning. So, I watched during that day and kept the dogs away, but no luck.

The next morning I went back out and sure enough, he had come down and was hiding in the logs. I managed to gather him up and take him back to the barn. Both needed to be checked out at the animal clinic, especially the little one whose eyes were matted and inflected. So, in one fell swoop, I had already spent considerable money on the little strays, and it was obvious I now had two new family members to help me with my new life by myself.

I reintroduced them to Porche, who looked at me with eyes that said, okay, I’ll leave them alone.  Cookie, on the other hand, couldn’t get enough of them, and before I knew it, she and Elwood had become BFFs.

Sadly, not long after, I lost Porche to a ruptured tumor bleeding internally  She would have been thirteen this year, not an old dog, but getting there. Bless her heart, Cookie and I miss her.

So, Arlo and Elwood and I became BFFs, too. When I would sit down, here they would come for lap time. At the same time.

They helped me weed in the cactus garden. Had to share the knee pad with them. But they are always there when I am working outside.

I discovered Delectables trying to find something that Minnie would eat as she got older, and she did. So I gave some to these two, and they love it and have come to expect it every day.  Arlo meows for it as I get it in their dishes, and Elwood sits on the corner of the table expecting it to come. They seem to be addicted to it!

Anywhere Cookie and I go, like across the street to the dumpster, they come, too.

They still try to get in my lap at the same time, but as they are getting bigger, I am running out of room. Now, they tend to take turns. They do love their  lap time.

Since they were dumped, I have no idea if they were both from the same litter or not. Elwood was a smaller kitten, and Arlo was a bit larger, so perhaps a bit older. And they look nothing alike, but kittens in the same litter don’t always look alike.  But I got to thinking about it. I lost my beautiful Siam, and here’s Elwood who may not be full-blooded Siamese, but has all the right characteristics except for a smooth silky coat of fur. Frosty was a large gray and white cat who wouldn’t be called a tuxedo cat like Arlo because he wasn’t black, but their colors covered their white bodies in much the same way. Now these two are sort of replacements for the two I lost. My friend Pat always says there are no coincidences in God’s world. These two have filled a hole in my world.

Coincidence, indeed.