She's Baaaaaaaaaack

Ok. So you may or may not know about the fifth member of our family, our cat, Phyllis. We have had her for a long time...since 1998, however many years that has been. She has moved at least six time (probably more) and survived being infiltrated by two babies but otherwise has lived a fairly uneventful life. That is, until we moved here. In the year and a half that we have lived here, she has disappeared for weeks at a time on a number of occasions. The first time she left, we had Only lived here for about a month and the circumstances in our life were quite chaotic. I am embaressed to say that she had been missing for a couple of weeks before I noticed. (In my defense, there really were much more important things happening at the time.) I thought for sure she was a goner. It was cold and we hadn't lived here that long. Robbie said, "Maybe she's in a tree.". I said, "Maybe she's in a coyote." We told the kids that she had gone to a farm. What else could we do? Then, one day, at least six (yes, SIX!)weeks after she disappeared, she came home. We whooped and hollered in disbelief. The kids begged her not to go back to the farm. We couldn't believe it. But WHERE had she been? She was skinny...really skinny considering that at her most recent checkup the vet had suggested that she lose 40% of her body weight. Well, mission accomplished I suppose. Within a month or two, she was back to fighting weight and sometime over the summer she wandered off again. This time, we started to worry after a couple weeks went by but low and behold she came back after only a month this time.

Sometime in April, we noticed she was gone again. Seriously? Where could she be? We pretty much live in the woods and I know there are a lot of animals out there. She's no spring chicken so I do worry about her out there. But once again, just when I was feeling like the worst pet owner ever, she showed up at the back door late at night. Hungry, but otherwise none the worse for the wear. This time, it was apparent that she had been eating. So the question remains: where does she go and do those people wonder where she spends the other ten months a year?

***For the one of you who is confused on the gender of my cat, let me remind you that while Phil is indeed a boy name, Phyllis is actually a girl.