A few months ago, the GF and I saved a feral cat from starving to death. There were several feral cats around our acreage but, eventually there was only 2 that we saw on a regular basis. One of those cats wouldn't leave no matter how many times we tried to chase it off and meowed at us constantly. Eventually, we paid a bit more attention to her and noticed she had a bad left rear leg. She limped when she walked and when she tried to run she couldn't put weight on it and ran on 3 legs. So, we put out a little food for her and gained some trust to the point where we could actually touch and pet her a bit. That's when we noticed how skinny she was. You could feel every vertebra in her back. She was also very dirty around her mouth, a sign she's not cleaning herself and was in distress. Half her ears were gone, likley frozen off at some point. It was obvious she couldn't hunt in her condition and would likely starve to death so, we made the decision to help her out.
We put out food and water every day. I built a cat house out of scrap wood, put some straw in it for bedding and surrounded it with straw bales so she had somewhere to get out of the cold. We put de-wormer in her food. Short of taking a feral cat to the vet, we did as much as we could to give her a fighting chance. She started trusting us enough that she wanted to be petted but, was still super skittish. Her leg started to heal and she was putting on weight.
When it started to get really cold she decided she liked it better inside than outside and hasn't gone outside since. So, we now have a pet. I didn't want a pet, cat or dog, but, sometimes, fate, God or something else decides for you. She's now roughly twice the weight from when we made the decision to help her and her leg is fully healed. She still has some feral traits but, those are gradually going away.
I'm not overly religous, I tend towards the agnostic end of things. I do believe in fate/karma, though. I have felt it's effects before. While I don't know whether we were actually doing the Lords work, or not, I know we did a good thing by saving a life. The question is, did we adopt a kitty or did she adopt us?
Edit, I forgot to add that since this kitty has been inside, the other feral kitty that frequents our acreage has spent significant time in the cat house I built. It's a large male tabby, very healthy but, we still leave some food out for him. He's very friendly but, I've seen him marking his territory on my truck. Fucker!
