Missy Kitty takes a giant leap into springtime

No one could be happier about the early arrival of spring in these parts than Missy Kitty.

In case you aren't a regular reader of this column (possible) or have spent the last 22 years abducted by aliens (not likely), Missy Kitty is the gray-striped cat with white paws and bib that rules her home and her surroundings, which happen to be shared by her obedient humans, who happen to be your scribe and his wife.

As for our recent spate of fair weather and warm temperatures, Missy Kitty is again relishing the outdoors, being a creature who is equally at home indoors or out. During the most recent cold-weather months, Missy Kitty became what can be generously described as a blob.

I mean it. A blob.

Let me describe Missy Kitty's day during those winter months: In for her morning share of milk in her special bowl in the kitchen. Out for a few bites of dry food in her special bowl in the garage. Scratching at the living-room windows to be let in. Begging for more milk. Sometimes getting it. Off to her padded chair. Curling up into a tight ball (volleyball in early winter, basketball in late winter) and sleeping all day.

All day means until dusk, which, thanks to you-know-what, comes in what seems like midafternoon.

Then it's time (standard, of course) to beg for more milk before going out for a bite or two and scratching on the windows to be let in so she can curl up in her chair until we go to bed and she is kindly asked to go to her heated bed in the garage, replete with food and water.

We aren't sure what Missy Kitty does while we sleep. We're not sure we want to know. But we surmise she doesn't necessarily do a lot of sleeping. Otherwise, how could she sleep from early morning to late at night without twitching many muscles during her daily hibernation?

Now that it's warm outside, Missy Kitty is spending more and more time outdoors. Again, we have no idea what she does outside the confines of the house, but we know she's usually ready for a mini-hibernation by dark.

Missy Kitty, who has assiduously avoided our laps for years has, little by little, become something of a lap cat in recent weeks. She even jumped into the lap of my wife (the allergic one) one recent evening. Even when Missy Kitty reluctantly agrees to fall asleep in my lap, the duration of her repose is determined by how quickly her internal heating system starts to boil. Off she goes to her chair to cool off.

One of Missy Kitty's favorite watchposts when she is outside is one of two tall urns on our front porch. The urns sported masses of blooming flowers during the summer and well past Thanksgiving, due to the mildness of last year's autumn. Now the plants have been trimmed back to look like the coarse bristles of an upturned scrub brush. Missy Kitty doesn't mind. From atop the urns she can survey a large bit of real estate, just in case some of the neighborhood cats are lurking about.

Here's the big mystery about Missy Kitty's preference for the urns: How does she manage to get to the top of them? They are, after all, several feet off the ground. And Missy Kitty is Â… well Â… a bit on the well-fed side, if you know what I mean. This presents something of a physics issue (weight plus gravity plus height should equal one stymied cat). But there she is, sitting as pretty as you please on top of the urn of her choice.

A considerable period of time passed before I was able to witness the miracle of the leaping feline with my own eyes.

I was sitting in my La-Z-Boy, which is next to the window where Missy Kitty's chair resides. This is the window that overlooks the front porch. On several instances I would see Missy Kitty on the porch and, seconds later, would see her on top of the urn. But how she got there happened so quickly I missed it.

Finally, about a week ago, I saw Missy Kitty on the porch looking at the top of the urn. Aha! This was my chance.

What I witnessed was pretty amazing. Missy Kitty carefully calculated all the required essentials: height, gravity, weight. Then she hunkered down and pushed off with her hind legs, reaching up with her front paws to grab the edge of the top of the ceramic urn and pull herself onto the bristles of last year's verbena clump. She immediately licked her front paw and started to wash her face. No big deal, thank you. Just something to do until it was time (her time, not standard or daylight saving) to scratch the window to be let in for a bowl of milk and another nap on her padded chair.

So, if you have cats and wonder what they are doing when you aren't looking, always imagine that the preposterous is normal for furry felines.

Just ask Missy Kitty, the jumping cat of Cape Girardeau. And mighty proud of herself, too, judging by the flick of her tail.

Joe Sullivan is the retired editor of the Southeast Missourian.