A Forever Foster is not “the best of both worlds.”

A Forever Foster is the birth of another world entirely.

It is no coincidence that these brand new worlds belong to grand old cats.

Although cats own everything, including your half-eaten bowl of ramen, General Electric, and Luxembourg, old cats may appear empty-handed.

Adopters did not get into fisticuffs over Fergie. The multitudes were not burning up for Smokey. We didn’t get many orders for a seventeen-year-old Smoothie.

We could weep and snivel over this, but that would be so … human.

I am usually in favor of anthropomorphizing the cats. It is the only way our humble brains can process their poetry. We think of them as better-looking versions of us, and they are generous enough to permit this. Usually.

But there is a limit to every allegory. Old cats are not tweedy wallflowers who did not get asked to dance. Old cats are not flooding their pillows with tears, wondering if they will ever be picked.

Old cats are aware that they own everything, whether or not anyone decides to “own” them.

Old cats have been at this “cat” business long enough to own themselves.

And old cats are open to the possibility of new worlds.

There is the world of Tabby’s Place, which is the best. There is the world of an adoptive home, which is also the best. There are rude little worlds of baths, diets, injustice, and UPS deliverypersons wearing short shorts, which sometimes intrude into this world.

But even that is tolerable, because there is no limit to the number of worlds waiting to be born.

We have glimpsed the atlas, and it is astounding. I would not believe it if I didn’t see it myself.

There is a world where a veterinary technician outruns grief and outlasts sorrow. At least, she looks like a veterinary technician, but Drew’s disguise isn’t fooling anyone. She is a heart without fences, or else she could not be our foremost Hospice Foster.

She has been mother to multitudes: Sophia and Maxey, Lola and Franklin, Harley and Adira and Duck and many, many more. She embraces them open-eyed. She is not intimidated by the specter of goodbye, gnawing their tails and taunting her efforts.

She does not have some secret tourniquet to staunch her bleeding heart. She has been devastated by every loss. She will be devastated by every loss. She will love again, with the cumulative strength of all her babies. They are all her babies. They are all still with her as she cares for her latest, her Smoothie, her new world.

There is a world where our Director of Volunteers does the math, and a 10-year-old cat with 1.5 ears and 99 chronic illnesses (give or take) adds up to 100%, A+, flawless.

Fergie has Karina’s heart on speed-dial. Karina has other Forever Fosters, and each is the center of her solar system. The most important cat in Karina’s universe is Hector, and Verde, and Stefan, and Twinkie, and Veronica, and Gus, and Gaia.

They are not tied for number one. They are all actually number one. This is possible when your compassion constructs a world that is bigger than this world, even though it is also inside of it.

Every loss burns. Every sun still sends heat and light from beyond the horizon. Every hour of Fergie’s life has led to Karina. Everyone knows Karina took Fergie home, but Fergie is Karina’s home.

There is a world where a volunteer, without pay or pageantry, swaddles kittens who intend to do her harm. It is not personal. It’s just that she’s human, and they do not like that species. Yet.

While they rage, roll, and spit like possessed salamanders, she calmly wraps them in soft cloths and holds them to her chest. They watch television together.

Donna is not in a rush. It will take as long as it takes. These bewildered burritos resist and resist until at last, they receive. Their frightened limbs go limp as linguini. Battle-babies sweeten into Butterfingers. Once Donna has won their hearts for humankind, they fly off to adoptive homes.

But one old kitten wrapped Donna in his light. At sixteen, Smokey still wants to watch television with someone who is not in a rush. The angel of the kittens has strong enough wings for a Forever Foster. It is time for Smokey to receive.

Our world, with its storms and hatreds, can shake us to our foundations. But Tabby’s Place is a world within a world, where love makes everything new.

Even old cats.

Especially old cats. We are in awe of you, Forever Fosters.

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