This is tilly

Tilly is my cat, and I’m maybe a little bit too obsessed with her. But most people who meet her are. She’s 9 years old but looks and acts like a baby, in fact she’s really tiny at only 7 pounds. She is constantly all up in whatever I’m doing, or at least she needs to be in the same room as me, so she’ll follow me from room to room even if I’m just getting up to grab something. She loves to cuddle, especially when it gets chilly, and is an aggressive lap sitter. Her favorite foods are stinky fishes, pizza, and all components of pizza- it is for this reason that you cannot leave Italian dishes unattended in our home. She knows how to sit, shake and high-five, as well as a few other little tricks, and I’m currently teaching her to roll a die when I put one in front of her. She doesn’t have a voice anymore, when she meows it’s either little crinkling sounds or nothing at all. Whenever we have friends over, she will sit with us and watch us speak in turn as if she can understand what we’re all saying. She has no teeth (for medical reasons) and when she’s annoyed with you she will harmlessly gum your hands. The one thing I’m not thrilled with is that sometimes she’ll wake me up too early in the morning by petting my hair. In other words, she’s pretty great.

Tilly is a shelter cat. She got there in pretty bad shape, and for this reason, she lost her teeth. Before we took her home in February 2016, she had sat in a shelter for two years, because she was scared of people and would lash out. Children generally weren’t allowed to handle her, and she had a DNR on her medical records. But something clicked when she met me and my husband Rich, and I couldn’t ask for a more special buddy. This is why whenever I talk to people who are expressing an interest in getting a pet, I always tell them to go and ask to meet their local shelter’s adult cats. Kittens are nice, but people are less likely to take home an adult cat, despite the fact that adult cats form incredible bonds with people, often more so than a kitten.

Below is a gallery of some excellent Tilly pictures we have taken over the years. I hope you enjoy!