Over the last eight years, I’ve learned that nothing stays the same for very long in this house — whether people or animals. Within a few months of moving in, my fiancée died suddenly. When it came to cats and dogs — mostly cats — she was as potty as me. She was always a beacon of light in the dark for four-legged waifs and strays that crossed her path. So when she died, there were fourteen cats and three dogs left behind. Most of those cats had come into her life while we were together, and I made the decision to try and keep them together. The oldest cat and dog died not long after Julia passed. A puppy had to be rehomed. The last dog, Charlie, fell in love with my mum, who was living here at the time — it was mutual — and he moved in with her. That left me with thirteen cats, which is probably more than most people will ever own in their lifetime. They were all here when the blind kittens, Harry and William, arrived — and all went well. So when I later got a call from a friend about another blind kitten needing a home, I wasn’t concerned about how my cats would cope. I already had that experience. I was still concerned about William. Although he was fine with me by then, he remained withdrawn. But that was all about to change.
All of our lives were about to change.
Another friend of a friend, Pertev at Hospetal, had a blind kitten who needed a home. Could I help?
By that point, I already had two blind cats, and they had caused no real difficulty. So I went to see her.
She was striking. I had never seen colouring or markings like hers. When the cage door opened, she ran straight towards me and climbed into my arms. That was enough.
I brought her home.
She spent her first days in my bedroom, as Harry and William had done before her. Then the morning came to introduce her to the rest of the house.
Furby was always on my shoulders
What happened next wasn’t something I could have predicted.
As with the other blind cats, I opened the bedroom door at breakfast time and let Furby follow her nose. She did — straight into the kitchen. Dish on the floor. Straight in.
Breakfast over, it was time to meet the family.
They all took to her — every cat. Even some of my biggest, like Jackson and Big Foot, began staying close. Big Foot, a huge black cat and one of the three kittens born in the garden, became something of a bodyguard. As she moved, so did he — not always beside her, but never far away.
Big Foot was the largest of the garden-born trio. His brother was Grey Cat, who many of you know from YouTube, and his sister was Quizzie. Big Foot and Quizzie had both been born with a deformed front paw and couldn’t run properly, but Big Foot was a gentle giant.
The biggest surprise — and the best news — was William. He suddenly perked up. He began taking an interest in life again and would let Furby sleep beside him on the sofa.
Blind kitten Furby helped William to live again
Furby soon took an interest in the olive tree, which caught me off guard. Then William followed suit, though he would only climb about a metre and a half before waiting for me to lift him down. Furby, on the other hand, had to be stopped from becoming too adventurous.
At that point, I didn’t know blind cats could climb trees. I was out of my comfort zone, and the panic in my voice didn’t help. But this was the year I was going to discover what blind cats were really capable of, given the chance.
Furby, the first blind cat to climb a tree
And it was only just beginning