So maybe the degree in Psychology isn’t totally going to waste - Alicia

The perky volunteer coordinator stopped me before I’d even signed in, asking me to show a maroon level cat. (Long story short, the cats are rated by a behaviorist. The old categories of levels 1 through 5 ranking them from most mellow to least mellow was perceived to slight the higher level cats and so were switched to colors, I believe based on the shades of volunteer aprons available. New levels are blue, tan, maroon and green.)

I take in the woman waiting at a glance – she’s probably my age, mid-forties, but looks older. Looks like she’s recovering from being beat up, actually, with a faded bruise under one eye and a missing front tooth, and her expression is somewhat submissive; she’s waited patiently till I arrived for my shift. There are five kitties in the big front condo and I ask which one she has in mind.

She doesn’t know yet, she wants to meet them and see. I would bet money that this woman is not here to adopt, but the cats need a visit, and with more than a pair housed together it’s good to have another person to give attention. This group is all feisty and playful and all under two years old. Barely out of kittenhood in other words, cute and fun. They rove around us, purring and sniffing, and one of them starts batting at the toy I’ve brought before I even move it.

The woman’s a cat person. She sits and pets each one, admiring its special qualities. And she talks, almost non-stop. First about former cats she’s had, then about where she lived when she had them, which had kittens, which ones she gave away and to whom, and where they might be living now. There are references to relatives in Arkansas and to people with drug habits living in 8 story apartments, which I translate to Tenderloin hotels.

I notice she’s got a plastic band on her wrist, and I suppose she’s just gotten out of a hospital. She does not seem so out of it nor down and out that she has nowhere to go. But neither is she in a hurry to go wherever qualifies as home. I listen to her with respect and react appropriately to her stories. She is hungry for such simple attention, the way the cats compete with each other to nudge our hands to keep petting them.

Kiwi, a sweet chubby torbie girl, gets bored with playing and goes back to napping in the sun. Little Alicia, soft and all black, settles down by the woman, blissfully enjoying the stroking and chin rubs.

"This is the one I’d take," the woman says softly, her monologue fading out. "You tell whoever gets her how lucky they are."

Wistful but seeming satisfied with her visit, she leaves the condo and heads back into the winter afternoon.