Lulu turned 17 yesterday. I can still remember meeting her for the first time: I had gone to the house of a woman I worked with at IKEA, Claudia. She had found a pregnant stray in the alley beside her house and took her in. The cat had 6 kittens: 5 black and white girls and one orange tabby male. Claudia invited me over to pick out which kitten would be mine. She put all of the girls on the bed so I could crouch down and get a good look at each one. I wanted a kitten with a white spot on her face because my beloved childhood cat, Phred, had a spot. Lulu did not have a spot, so I wasn't really paying attention to her. The kittens were going crazy: falling over each other and fighting. It was hard to get a sense of who was who. After awhile I noticed the one cat with the pure black face had come and sat up against me. In that moment it was as if she was saying, "You are MY human!" That was the sign I needed. Now she's been with me 17 years. She still likes to be close to me. She sleeps on my pillow at night with her body pressed against my head. She follows me around the house and waits for me to settle before she finds a spot nearby to sleep. I was 26 when I got her and now I am 43. She's a special princess cat with a loud demanding voice. She demands to be pet whenever Thom comes in to the bedroom. It's a longstanding joke that Lulu thought she was the one marrying Thom... that's why we found black cat hairs in my wedding dress. I'm happy to share Thom with her... she's a classy lady.

