Hero, or close enough

I'm starting a new category to periodically visit here in the blog. It's called, "Spam in my email." In today's installment, Diedre Whitehead wants to know if I "Want it to hang?" No, Diedre. I don't.

Moving on. The ASPCA gave out some awards to hero pets yesterday. Did I ever tell you my hero cat story? I don't believe I did. Grab a cup of coffee and prepare to be enthralled and amazed.

A few years ago, I was housesitting for my parents. They had two cats at the time: an indoor/outdoor cat named Domino (black and white) and an outdoor cat named Sammy (all black). Dommie always slept inside in my parents' room, and he really didn't like to sleep in the guest rooms. Their guest rooms are on another floor, and maybe he didn't like to be downstairs or something. I don't know. But while housesitting, I slept in their room so he'd have some company.

Well, one night, about 1:00 a.m., he starts meowing from the doorway. It woke me up, and at first I tried to ignore it, thinking if he thought I was asleep, he'd stop. He didn't. So, then I tried to being stern. I raised up, found the blob where the sound was coming from (I'm blind without my glasses, and I wasn't putting on my glasses - I might wake up too much), and told him to hush in tough tone. He kept meowing. Okay. So, then I patted the bed and tried to get him to come to me - "Maybe he wants some lovin'," I thought. No dice. Kept meowing - really insistently.

Finally, I gave up, turned on the light and put on my glasses. It wasn't Domino! It was Sammy! WTF? How is Sammy in the house, and why is he all the way up upstairs in the bedoroom???? This cat barely lets his paws touch the tile in the entry - he *never* comes all the way inside, much less upstairs.

So, I got up, and started to go to him, thinking he might be hurt or something, but still totally confused how he was even in the house. As I approached, he ran away, but kept stopping to look back - trying to get me to follow him. When I finally reached the stairs and looked down, the front door was wide open!

Presumably, the door had blown open with a cold front that had blown in that night. And Sammy knew it shouldn't be open, and he knew I was in the house alone, and I shit you not, that cat went completely against his natural instinct and came inside and upstairs to wake me to show me that the door was open! Can you believe that???

As soon as I saw that it was open and reacted, he ran outside and didn't come back in, and for the record, I've never seen him come inside voluntarily since then. Of course, I was way too freaked out then to stay in the house by myself the rest of the night. I'm sorry, but I'm a Houston girl. The very idea of sleeping with the doors unlocked, much less open, is ludicrous to a Houston girl. Why not just sleep in the front yard with all your valuables on the sidewalk? Am I right, Judy?

I checked the whole house, but I knew there was no way I'd really be sure that no one had come in while the door was wide open and I was sleeping, so I packed up my stuff and drove home in the middle of the night. But hey - at least I slept the rest of the night in peace.

Sammy, however, earned himself the moniker "Sammy The Wonder Cat" that night. And that's my hero cat story.