Counting Our Blessings:
Stories From Friends

We would love hear about your own animal blessings and will post as
many of them as we can.  Here are some we'd like to share with you.

Barbara   Cheryl   Geoff   Leslie   Linda   Lynn   Mary   Muriel

The Blessings Animals Give Us Every year, Friends of Roman Cats (FORC) gives its annual party to celebrate "The Blessings Animals Give Us".  It is based on a centuries old Italian festival, "The Blessing of The Animals" which takes place on the feast day of St.Anthony Abbot, the patron saint of domestic animals.  While it used to be that farmers would bring their donkeys, goats and geese to be blessed, now companion animals receive a blessing.

St. Anthony Abbot Click to enlarge

Grace's early years are a mystery, but when she was about five years old, she found her way to the home of an elderly couple who took her in. Unfortunately, just a couple of years later, the man of the house died and his wife moved to a nursing home. Their children neglected Grace and left her outdoors to fend for herself. My mother, who lived across the street, kept her from starving. When Mom noticed that Grace had begun limping, she brought it to their attention, but they expressed no interest. Mom could stand their neglect no longer; she snatched the cat  ...

When my wife Joan was in graduate school at UCSF about 10 years ago, we lived in student housing on top of the hill behind the medical center.  We did not know it when we moved in, but the eucalyptus forest surrounding the complex was full of homeless cats.  A short time after our arrival, as we sat in our living room one night, we saw a mother cat and her three kittens looking in through the glass patio door ...

Jerry was adopted from a shelter in Boston 17 years ago this April by my husband's grandmother.  When she passed away a year or two later, Ted became Jerry's "adoptive father". 

When Jerry was about two years old, he disappeared for almost three months....

Muriel's Blessings  Bugatti and Galeno I found Bugatti in a Roman street one evening.  I was returning to the convent where I was staying in Rome. I took a wrong street (thank God) and I heard a little invisible animal screaming very loudly.  I knelt down and a little black cat came to me.  He was very dirty, full of parasites and I could see his bones underneath his fur.  Bugatti and Galeno  (con't)  Posted: 3/31/02

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Mary's Blessings Woodstock He was my first cat and had many lessons to teach.  Animals have always been a part of my life. And in walked this cat. His person was moving and his first response to being left at my house was to sneak out and spend Thanksgiving with neighbors.  After I recovered from that desertion, we worked well together as he taught me how a cat runs a household. He hated suitcases and would always follow me around the apartment until he bit my ankle to let me know he was put out by my being away.   He lived to be 15 and fought a valiant fight against kidney failure once again letting his person know it was time to say goodbye. Woodstock & Friends  (con't)  Posted: 3/17/02

Linda's Blessing Maggie Mo Whenever Maggie looks at me,  questioningly and with the innocence of a child seeking reassurance, I remind her that she will always be special because she healed my heart.  Maggie, along with her siblings Amelia, Marty and Andy, came to us just weeks after we lost our beloved twelve-year-old Ashley to a rapid and fierce battle with adenocarcinoma. Nowhere near ready to open ourselves up to love again, we were even less prepared to live in the deafening silence that echoed through our home once Ashley no longer stalked the halls and warmed the foot of the bed. Foster parenting, through the San Francisco SPCA, however, was something we believed we could manage. Maggie Mo  (con't) Posted: 3/17/02

Dear Ciarlone, my adopted Roman cat, dances with his mouse toy. He moves so lightly, he’s so fluid of foot, he’s doing the tango, maybe. He’s an athlete, a singer and a dancer.

I found him at Torre Argentina Cat Sanctuary. Actually he found me. I was dropping off some work one night when I heard a heart-rending plaintive yowl coming from somewhere in the row of cages against the back wall. I walked over to see who was so upset.