The magic of tuna!

Yesterday morning my wife had to leave for work at 6:00 a.m.  I decided not to arise with her as I have been the past few days and cuddled under my blankets and snoozed.  The kids and i got up at 7:15 (which is wildly late for me and the tribe!) and went downstairs to start breakfast.  I saw there was a note on the table but was busy hauling eggs and such from the fridge.  KC read it:  "Valkyrie got out at 6:05" the note read.  Val is our young black cat.  While I had been snoozing, she was outdoors.  The kids were horrified.  I looked outside.  No Val.  Rob looked outside and eventually spied her but she would not come to us. Val was a stray that he gentled and brought in over a year ago.  She likes all of us, but loves Rob.

We had to get ready to leave for church and it was a very angst filled morning as we drove away leaving her still on the loose.  We placed her crate with a warm blanket and some food where she could get in, hoping she might curl up there while we were gone.  I stressed inwardly over the fact that we live on a very busy street and wondered what we would find when we drove home.

Which was exactly nothing.  When my wife got home at 5:30 she was still missing.  KC was so upset he had asked to go to bed at 5. He and Lissa had made prayer beads at church that spelled Val's name and he held those and stared at the little tree by his bed.

Enter the fabulous world of Internet friends!  I posted our sad status on Facebook and someone wrote that if we had really smelly tuna they thought that she would come. No cat, it was alleged, could resist such a treat. We had no tuna.  I am vegetarian and in an odd twist of fate, both K and myself have mothers who are allergic to fish. So we did not grow up eating fish or having it around.  And I have no sense of smell; I did not even know it was smelly!  :-)  Our cats eat the dried cat food, I have never done wet food except for a brief time when we weaned Val's kittens.

K went out to get said tuna and it worked! She came right over to her and ate some off her finger.  Eventually after some patient feedings, she was able to grab her and put her in the crate and bring her back in the house.  KC was still awake, despite having asked to go to bed so crazy early.  I will never forget the absolute glow on his face as Val ran into the bedroom he shares with Rob. What a blessing!