God creates all life and as the intellectual ones with brains and feelings we are put on this planet to protect the "inferior" species.

How many times have you heard that in your lifetime? What do you do about it? Do you take daily action and care for the animals around you? Are you too busy with your daily activities to even take notice them?

We are blessed to live in the mountains and we see a lot of wild life. Some of it is not so wild but that is another story for later. Our yard seems to collect various animals and birds in various stages of hunger and injury and abandonment. There is a major highway near and some animals seem to just get "dropped" off near us. In fact, out of the 5 cats that I have owned, 3 of them adopted me!

During this past summer a stray cat started coming into our yard. She was a pretty calico but very thin and obviously hungry. She was mostly white with some tan and yellow to make her very colorful. Of course, having cats, we had plenty of food and I began setting out food to see if she would come to eat it.

Oh! Yes, she came to eat………with gusto! She was one very hungry animal. Since we have also have skunks and raccoons we cannot leave pet food out side all the time. I started putting the food out at the same time every day and in a few days she was a regular. We have no idea where she came from but obviously she did not belong to anyone who cared much about her. She was so thin! We put out rich foods like milk and tuna and she loved it. Then within a few days I walked up to her to see if she would let me touch her. To my surprise she let me pet her. She really liked to be petted. The next day, I stayed in my outdoor chair and waited for her to finish eating. When she was done, she came over to me and jumped up into my lap, again to my surprise. She seemed to want a lot of love. She liked to sleep on top of the toolbox in the back of the pick up parked in the carport. I took some old fabric and made her a bed.

Then one day when we were gone, there was a really bad thunderstorm and she got soaked! When we came home, I felt so bad for her that I took a towel and dried her off and make a clean bed for her using a dry blanket. She snuggled right down but did not seem to want to eat.

The next day, she did not eat anything either. Now, I was becoming concerned about her. She did not want to drink her milk and she only wanted to be held and petted. I was toying with the idea of taking her to the vet. We made a bed for her in the garage in the trunk of my car so she would be protected from the rainstorms and other animals during the night.

Little Cali-Kitty (what we had named her) stayed in the trunk and still refused food for another day. The next morning when I went to check on her, she just raised her head and made a meek little meow sound. I knew she was really sick and I had waited too long to take her for help. Having work to do, I returned to the house. Later, Cali-Kitty meowed loudly at the back door. By the time I got out there, she was nowhere to be seen.

She had gone off to die and was telling me "Good by". This soft, furry little cat made me cry to think that she had come to us and was sick all along and found some shelter with us for the end.

It made me wonder how Mother Teresa ever did her work so well. I felt such a loss over a stray animal and Mother Teresa intentionally went out to find human beings to help while they were to sick to get well. In her comfort and loving arms, they would complete their journey in this life and move on to our Lord. It gave me a new insight to what a wonderful woman Mother Teresa must have been to be able to help so many people for so many years, knowing all the time that there would be tragedy just as there had been for Cali-Kitty. I found a small amount of solace in knowing that I had shared love for an abandoned animal and Mother Teresa shared love for abandoned people of the world! May she have the best that God has to offer now!