Cat Lady

There was a little black cat running around the neighborhood for a while. I named him Rooster. He'd sometimes show up in my front yard, sometimes he'd be in the back alley, but he always ran away from me. I put food out on my deck once, hoping that he'd realize that I'm a nice person and would befriend me. No luck.

Rooster, I learned, is a girl and apparently gave birth to a pride of kittens a few weeks ago. They're living on my deck, as I found out last night. I was listening to my ipod with my earbuds in, making dinner, and stepped out on the deck to pick some basil. I turned around to see if Roni was making moves towards the storm door and behind me I heard a small thump. I heard another thump and then little feet, running. I was frozen, certain that what was behind me was a family of racoons or skunks or badgers.

I slowly turned around to see a kitten dangling from the screen of the screened in porch. Another kitten was sitting on one of my porch chairs. From around the doorway of the screened porched peered another kitten. And then Rooster appeared, walking towards me and sitting down in between me and the kittens. The kittens swarmed her. I stood motionless, unable to process everything at once: was that Rooster? Were they LIVING on my porch? If they were living there, how long had they been there? Are they ferrel? I backed up to the storm door, wanting to get some cat food and water and Rooster started to approach me. I didn't THINK I had made any threatening moves towards her or the kitties but it scared me, nonetheless.

I was probably inside getting tupperware and cat food for no more than 2 minutes. When I came back to the door, this is what I saw:

I gingerly stepped outside and slowly placed the food and water bowls down, not sure if Rooster would think it was a threatening gesture. In SECONDS the kitties were bounding towards the food and ravenously ate.

I sat down on a chair to watch and take pictures while Rooster watched her kitties fight for position in the food bowls. I made a kissing noise to get one of the kitties to look at me for a picture and Rooster approached me and slid in between my legs, rubbing against me. Soon one of the kitties followed her and rubbed up against my leg, giving me this picture:

They were still there this morning, sleeping in a big huddle until I opened the door to give them more food. Then the kittens started bounding over each other and rolling around...being the cutest kittens that ever lived. I soooooooo want one of these little kitties. I want to pick them up so bad and play with them but George Clooney warned me they may have fleas.

Does getting a kitten make me a cat lady??