Cats With Jobs:
Keeper of the cans at Home for Life is Shadow, a black medium hair neutered male cat who is from Minneapolis. We took him in at the end of August 2024 through the Universal Cat Distribution system.
Shadow's owner had to give up her apartment and we'd been trying to help her find rescue resources to help her two cats for several months before we took Shadow in.
Wrote Nicole in an email, " Unfortunately my life has been tipped upside down and I need to rehome my 2 male cats.😥Shadow is about 3 years old and Ocean is about 4. I will be having a major surgery soon and have to move due to upcoming financial issues. Ocean is very loving to people but not so much animals. He is mainly an indoor cat but will go out sometimes. He loves to cuddle. Shadow is mainly an outdoor cat but he will come up for food and pets. Please let me know if you can take them 😥 I don’t know what I will do if you guys cannot take them. I don’t have any other options. I’ve heard many great things about your sanctuary"
In August 2024 Nicole had to turn in her keys for her place. Ocean the cat found a home with a relative but they put Shadow outside of the apartment building, with nowhere else to go with him. She emailed us one last time to ask for help for Shadow. Although our cat runs were under remodeling at the time, we agreed to take him—realizing that leaving him outside of his old home base, was a prescription for disaster—death by car, starvation, cruelty or unwanted at an animal control.
Shadow was said to like the great outdoors, but at Home for Life®, he decided he wanted to be a "kitchen cat" one of the cats who reside in our main cat building common area. Further, Shadow gave himself a job, as cats often will; that is, the "keeper of the cans" where he perches on the shelving with our supply of canned dog and cat food in the back-room area, to keep watch and track. He seems to prefer the dog food side of the shelves.
It is a relief to see Shadow safe and comfortable at Home for Life®, rather than outside and on the streets to face his fate, especially during the Halloween season, never a time we want to see black cats at risk and trying to survive by their wits outdoors or during a Minnesota winter.
The universe must have known we needed a cat to keep track of our canned food and sent us Shadow. Shadow often combines business with pleasure, sunbathing on the food shelves in the afternoon sunshine that streams in from the large west window in the food room. After a hard day's work on the job, it's time for a catnap, which he prefers to take on the food shelves. Shadow knows he is where he belongs, at a home for life!
We acknowledge the serendipity of the universal cat distribution system which brought Shadow to Home for Life®, the cat for the job we didn't know we needed!
Read more about the #universalcatdistribution system which puts deserving cats where they can land on their feet: