I stopped by and saw Friskey last Friday. I miss her. Her Eyesight isn't what it was, and when I discovered her lying in the east porch her head raised in alert. She did nothing but stare at me, through me. Then I spoke. "Hi Frisko," I crooned, and my old girl with all of her arthritis and extra weight bounded from her little alcove of boy clutter to get to me.

I was telling this story to Nick, and he questioned, "Frisko?" Frisko, Frisk, Friskarelli...I've known her for 17 years. A friend tends to pick up nicknames along the way through 17 years.

It made me cry, this sweet kitty who I grew up with, and was now getting old without me. I talked to her a good while while I combed her and cleaned her ears. Nick estimates that I wanted to get a kitten so I wouldn't be accused of talking to myself so often. He's so silly...I never talk to myself. There's usually a coffeemaker or a counter top or a wayward strand of hair involved. Anyway, I found some treats that Mom had bought before she died that were still sealed and moist, I gave her some of them. "Does anyone take a moment to let you know that you're loved anymore?" I murmured, as she was so hungry for attention.

I told her all about Sophie, and I know you shouldn't think this way, but in hindsight I know I was looking for another Friskey. "She's still getting used to us, I think..." I try to defend to my almond eyed calico with the pretty markings outlining them. She looks at me warmly, not really caring what I say, only that I keep talking to her. Sophie has a very sweet personality, I can tell it. She doesn't seem to have Frisko's attitude (or, as Mom called it, catitude)...at least not yet. She's still in that baby stage where everything is new and she's too busy watching everything that moves to offer a scathing remark regarding us humans' inability to do anything right. But she's not a lap kitty...at least not yet. She doesn't hear my voice and run to me, and she certainly doesn't look at me like I'm the best and most important person in her life.

But maybe that takes 17 years, or being a little girl's kitten, wrapped in blankets and carted around in strollers. A little girl who would run all the way from where the bus let her off after school to the house and search out her best bud. Mom got sick and Frisk didn't leave her side. The two of them bonded that way while I was living in the South, and I was grateful to have left such a sweet companion to hold my place when I couldn't be there. I nodded to myself taking the whole thing in, and admitted to myself, there's only one Friskey.

After our visit, I came home and emptied four new toy balls [I picked up on the way home] onto the living room floor for Sophie. She loves playing with balls. I am only now seeing more and more of her personality shining through as she becomes increasingly comfortable in our home. I love to situate her world with the things she loves, not showing that the scene has been manipulated, so that she may believe that only good things ever happen. I love coming home to find the living room scattered with balls and blankets askew because then I know that she had fun while I was away. I love the way she follows me around as I get ready in the morning, and I truly love the tilt of her head while she watches.

Friskey never really earned her name, choosing a quiet nap over something as inconvenient as play time, and I'm confident that eventually Sophie will settle down and I'll stop regretting that we didn't name her Spaz because of the way she hunkers down in the midst her her catnip toy buzz, stars at us, and then sprints up the stairs, down the stairs, up the stairs half way, down two steps, up all the way, down again, and then, grabbing a ball in her mouth exits through the kitty door to the basement.

This picture, to me, shows her sweetness so perfectly. In a moment of rest, her eyes are soft and warm, and I can see her heart is pure. It's been unfair of me to expect her to act like another when she's so perfect on her own, just as she is. I know it's not a good comparison in the eyes of all of you mothers out there, but it is like that point in your young child's life when you start to see the person they're going to be...and it's exciting to watch them grow.