Our pet cat was fondly called ‘Kuppi’. His unique trait was that he feared almost everyone and everything. Even smallest of the noises would make him run away and settle in the attic. When he was 6-9 months old, he was so sick that he wouldn’t eat anything. His name also came after his watery eyes and we names him after Uppi from ‘Rakta Kanneeru’, meaning blood tears. The K was added since his brother from older batch was named Kesari. My mom introduced him to cat food just to revive him. Surprisingly, he recovered so well that he transformed completely and became the cutest cat we have had so far
The cat food addiction held on, and he stopped eating anything else. His fear meant he was at home all day. He didn’t like to be touched, but our constant affection made him turn around and come to us for petting and get a nice massage.
We also wondered how he would survive in this world, but probably his fear was his strength. We have had more than 100 cats so far, but only a handful have survived past the first year. We always wondered what would win in Kuppi’s case- ‘Survival of the fittest’, or if ‘The meek shall inherit the earth’
We had to assign a ‘caretaker’, our friendly neighbor to feed him when we were off travelling. We always wondered if he would survive without us fending for him, but he somehow managed to come out safe every time. The first day back from travel always went searching for and waiting for Kuppi. He used to take even a day at times to come back from hiding (we don’t know his secret place). My mom was worried about upcoming travel, if he would survive this time since many more male cats had entered our neighborhood
Many other male cats in the neighborhood use to come not our house at night to pick fights with him. It became so frequent that he decided to spend the night away from our house. He used to sneak away at night, and we made so many attempts to figure out where he was off to. He was so quick that it was impossible to follow him in his run. After many days, we found out he used to go into one of the houses in the neighborhood away from the ‘villain cat’ Krishna
He used to come back every morning and we had another female cat come in and spend the mornings in our house together. We always felt blessed to have these wonderful beings in our lives. They made our day every day!
This Saturday he did not come back. There was an instance where he was missing for an entire day earlier but came back later. So, we thought this time was similar. Last night there was a catfight at 2:30 AM and we saw a golden colored cat fighting the villain cat. For a moment, we thought Kuppi was back, but it happened to be a lookalike (yes, there are so many in the neighborhood!)
It is Monday today and he is still not back. Mornings are not the same without him. He was the only one among the 4 siblings who survived atleast for 2 years. I still don’t want to believe we have lost him, there is still some optimistic feeling somewhere in our hearts that he might come back one day soon. We shall keep waiting for you Kuppi
PS: We have some good news! Kuppi was back Tuesday morning. No scratch on the body, not very hungry, doesn’t look like it was in bring trouble at all. It wants some privacy- no eye contact, just went to the attic to catch some sleep after having some cat-food as if nothing happening. We are giving it time till afternoon to recover before cuddling sessions start 🙂
We still had the villain cat come in at night and steal two pooris (bread), but that story is for another day. For now, the meek seem to be on the stronger side
PPS: We later noticed a wound on Kuppi’s leg. Probably that is the reason he was aloof, wanted to sleep and get red of the pain. He then came down to earth from the attic on his own in the evening, wanting to be petted. He is almost normal now, but for the wound which will hopefully heal soon
Probably a final note: Kuppi started taking longer breaks from home, 1 day, 3 day, and so on to finally disappear without trail. We do miss him, but the pain of sudden loss is reduced. We have Amulya, another cat bless our home with 4 kittens, filling our minds and hearts with joy. Some say cats come with a mission to protect you, leave when it is done. There is something karmic in the interactions, duration they stay and how they disappear -beyond my human logical reasoning
Other musings
Padukere- The comfort place for inner peace