Due to her stray cat ways, my cat was always an outdoor kind of feline. The best decision I made was to feed her little scraps the first time her skinny, furry body came around the neighborhood. After that, I was hooked. What was once me just feeding the cute cat that comes around every evening, turned into my indoor/outdoor best friend. At first I had named her Smokey, due to her short black and gray tabby hair, but after awhile she had fallen on the chubby side so her nickname became Tubby Cat.

Tubby was always an independent cat, she came and went as she pleased. Most times she cuddled at night and slept with me, but some nights she would sleep in the garage on her huge kitty bed which was massive compared to her. She truly was the perfect feline friend. She wouldn’t dare scratch or bite me, she loved long belly rubs, and she didn’t even mind me picking her up all the time.

On April 20th, 2009 early in the morning, I walked outside to my cat’s collar on the ground in the middle of the street. Immediately I knew something was wrong. I opened the garage to see if she was in there, I checked back inside the house to see if maybe she was inside and I didn‘t see her, I just didn’t want to believe that something happened to my one and only feline friend who never left my side. To my horror, I found her lifeless body on my front lawn. I still can never go into detail about what I saw and what had happened that day, but it was one of the hardest things I had ever had to go through.

After many sad and lonely days of no one around the house to keep me company anymore, I decided that maybe I was okay enough to try and get a new cat. I knew that getting a new cat wouldn’t replace the one I had lost and I will always hold a special place in my heart for her, but getting a new cat had suddenly just felt right. That same day I went to PETCO. I saw the most adorable, year old cat named Jellybean. He was an all black American Shorthair and he was the sweetest looking cat that had some of the qualities I had loved so much in my cat that I had recently lost.

At PETCO they did things a little bit differently than I had originally thought. I wasn’t able to take Jellybean home, what you’re supposed to do is e-mail the woman in charge of their pet adoptions and ask for a application for which ever cat you are interested in. So I went home that night and e-mailed her and requested an application. Two days later the woman e-mailed me back with the application and I immediately began to fill it out.

The application asked all different kinds of questions, like why you are interested in adopting a cat, and things like, would the cat be let outside. So I went on to tell this woman about how I had recently lost my cat and that sometimes I would let the cat go outside, but I would never have an outdoor cat again. I waited for an e-mail back from this woman all night and day. The next day, which had seemed like a life time, the woman in charge of the pet adoptions had taken the time to write me back. The e-mail said, “Your application to adopt the cat, Jellybean has been denied. Our cats are strictly indoor cats, they are under no circumstances able to be left outside, for someone who has recently lost their cat to the outdoors we would have figured you would have learned your lesson..”. I couldn’t believe what I had just read, I was in complete and utter shock. Not only had this woman denied me, she denied this cat of a new loving home and to make matters worse, had basically blamed me for my own cats death. After writing an e-mail back to this woman trying to clarify that this cat would not be an outdoor cat but I would from time to time let the cat outside to play for a little, I had realized nothing I said to this woman would change her mind.

After a week of her completely brushing me off and ignoring my e-mail, I decided to try PetSmart. Things had worked out for me, I have two loving and amazing cats now, who are in fact, completely indoors. Though even now I can’t get over the fact that this rescue adoption woman is going around denying rescue cats of a loving home. Instead of this cat Jellybean going home with me, he had to stay at PETCO in a cage no bigger than two feet wide. I will never understand why the woman denied me for wanting to let the cat do what it naturally wants to do like going outside and exploring. I also had no idea someone who is in the animal rescue business has the time to be so picky about who the cats are allowed to go home to. I understand wanting the cats to go to a good home, but me willing to let the cat go out into it’s own environment doesn’t make me any less of a loving owner. All has ended well for me and my two cats, but every now and then I do still wonder what happened to Jellybean and the rest of the PETCO adoption cats, I do hope they found wonderful, loving homes like the kind that they thought I was not able to provide.