Clarence

 Until last summer, we (I + Tony my husband) lived with two other family members — three really, but one of them is mostly elsewhere — in their beautiful Victorian gabled villa.

We had a little 1930s house let to tenants that became vacant in the summer and, as the economic changes in England are very adversarial to private landlords, we moved in there ourselves, and we love it. All of us are low-budget skinflints and living in separate dwellings gives us somewhere to go visiting. It's only a mile along the road from the home we left, so there's inbuilt exercise to the arrangement as well. Perfect.

I have a friend who is a Carthusian monk. We don't check in often because Carthusians are hermits who live in community, and I don't like to make over-frequent intrusions into the silence and seclusion of his vocation of prayer and adoration (plus he does actually have work to do in his rôle within the community). But we do correspond on a semi-regular basis, and I treasure the connection and his friendship. We hold his community in prayer and his community holds us in prayer — and my goodness, does it make a difference!

When we moved I told him about our new home, and he rather unexpectedly (but very firmly and decidedly) advised me that we should have a pet; a cat or a dog.

Two robustly territorial cats live next door on one side, and three less ferocious but fairly assertive cats live next door on the other side. Both contingents are used to coming into our garden and kindly spraying the plants and leaving us surprise turds in the grass and on the terrace. O how we value that, as you can imagine. Introducing a sixth cat in the middle would be an invitation to war.

Not only that, but the home we left behind is not without its animals. There were three dogs next door to whom we always served snacks (a Bonio plentifully buttered, and one-third of a sausage) every morning and every evening. There was a pair of crows and whatever current offspring they had in tow any given year, who came every day to stock up on raw meat for the family. And there was one ... then two ... now three ... foxes coming for breakfast and supper every day. Not only those clients but that house also has a resident cat of its own; Miguel who is elderly but fabulously glossy and still catching the occasional mouse.

When I was a girl, if you you took on a cat then you probably had it neutered, but after that all that happened was feeding it the cheapest food you could find once a day. No beds, no toys, no vaccinations; just co-existence ending with natural death and euthanasia, Not any more! Ha!

Miguel is neither large nor greedy, but even so the monthly amount to cover his food, his emergencies insurance and his monthly pet care plan comes in at £125 a month (about $170 US). In the modern world he must have annual vaccinations or else his emergencies insurance is invalidated. Recently his vet, looking at him thoughtfully and declaring him to be a good candidate for general anaesthesia (uh-oh), suggested that he be brought in to have his teeth cleaned. Under general anaesthetic. For £700 (about $1000 US). Which would be covered by neither his health plan nor his insurance. And if she found any dental work needed doing, her idea was that he could return a week later for a second general anaesthetic, where she could cut his gums, do whatever she thought necessary, and charge whatever that cost. 

In preparation for these procedures the vet advised that Miguel be given no food and confined to the house for 24 hours. Try explaining that to a cat who eats little and often and has never used a litter tray. Not going to happen.

We declined this wonderful opportunity — not least because general anaesthesia carries a significant risk of triggering or accelerating dementia in the elderly, and at the moment Miguel is very healthy — but it certainly concentrates the mind, does it not?

Because Miguel is the responsibility of both our households, and because feeding the foxes, the crows and the dogs next door was all my fault, every month we send across £65 ($85) towards Miguel's upkeep and I send across an additional £50 ($65) towards feeding the others. I also keep back all the soft tissue scraps from when I make bone broth and take it along in a tub for Foxy.

But it doesn't need a genius to see that adding a dog to these responsibilities would be a bridge too far — we are, after all, old age pensioners who no longer enjoy income from a rental property, and have just doubled our household expenses by leaving a shared house.

Furthermore, after the recent experience of Miguel's vet's bright idea for emptying our bank accounts, I felt queasy about establishing any further such entanglements with the long tentacles and avaricious eyes of Big Pharma.

Even so, I take very seriously the advice of a Carthusian monk. All that prayer doesn't just go to nothing, you know. When a Carthusian makes a recommendation, you do well to pay attention. They have a hotline.

Hmm.

But then one day last summer — this.

During the warm weather we had the doors and windows open, and this individual would often come in, have a look round, check all was well, and leave. Our neighbours' cats likewise used to come in and check the place out.

Our former tenants had a long-haired black cat called Bailey, so we got in touch to make sure Bailey had not returned from her new home. They said no, that this person on our windowsill was a regular visitor but they had never been able to establish where he (if it is a he) came from. They said they called him Clarence.

As summer moved into autumn, Clarence would occasionally stop by. Bearing in mind the Carthusian advice, eventually I bought a tub of cat treats and a bag of complete food. Clarence liked it. For the first time we heard his voice (quiet) and his purr (very loud). He let us stroke him. Clarence is a thin cat, and his fur often has burrs and grass seeds. We wonder if he is a stray. Not sure.

Then, recently, when the cold weather came, we progressed to this.

Never for long. He is watchful and alert even when dozing, and he doesn't make extended stays; he's just trying on the experience to see how it feels.

In the morning — around 8am in the light days of summer, more like 9am in the dark and cold of winter — Tony and I have a cup of tea and a time of prayer. Cats enjoy prayer, you know. If prayer is going on, they like to join in.

This morning when we met for prayer, there were the three of us.

I am not up for vets' fees running to hundred of pounds, and I have no wish to create mayhem in the already existing uneasy truce between neighbour cats. 

But this? Is it a Carthusian solution? I think it may be. 

And is it Clarence — or Clara?