Iris

Iris was a willowy adolescent kitten when I first saw her: playful and pretty, albeit a little sickly with runny eyes. She was from a Chicago shelter organization, which incidentally had Iris and her sister Gretchen fostered in a convent. She, her siblings, and her “alley cat” mother had apparently been rescued from quite an unpleasant situation. Iris was always skittish, perhaps haunted by ‘kittenhood’ trauma, or perhaps due to cognitive and hearing deficits. She was always a bit “different”, but that was also what made her so endearing. Even her sister Gretchen could sense Iris’ vulnerability and would often treat her maternally, cleaning her face and letting Iris nuzzle and rest her face in Gretchen’s chest. Iris had such a delicate little ‘mew’ that it would usually take three attempts of meowing to actually make her little peep. She also was extraordinarily light, and again perhaps due to her deficits, never a big ‘eater’, so her nickname was “Feather”. She was a precious, delightful blessing who will be sadly missed…