Making friends with Astro
After Leilani’s passing, I treasured my time with Astro. I had been feeling fine overall, but occasionally my mind would wonder off to what I could have done differently to help Leilani improve her life, not leave it. I also know we are here on the planet for a short time, and I don’t know all the reasons she chose to move on to the spirit world. Ultimately “we are all on our own timeline” like my good friend Mike said.
Astro moved into the barn around the time Leilani was having issues. While I was walking Leilani around one day, I saw Astro looking inside the barn, and then going in. I knew he had been in the barn before, but he never expressed interest in moving in while we had been here… I guess until the weather turned colder. So he made himself comfortable, and he never left!
He now lives in the barn at nights and roams around outside during the day, weather permitting, I see him sometimes sitting on rocks staring at the ground, looking for some goodies to eat.
About 10 days ago, during another freakish storm which brought us incredible cold (-14º F with a wind chill factor of -44ºF !), I was in the barn trying to figure out how to support Astro in staying warm. This cold spell only lasted 36 hrs, but caused so much drama and some damage too (frozen pipes burst in a few places, flooding some homes and businesses).
Waiting for cuddles
Astro didn’t seem to be worried, at least he was out of the wind; he wasn’t even using the heated pads we offered him. He DOES have a lot of hair!
While I was reaching out to him as usual, he just got closer and closer to my hand, and pretty soon he let me pet his head. You could see from what he had been doing for weeks that he really wanted to connect! This is no barn cat! I can see him splayed out inside the house soon, owning the space and telling us what to do :)
I believe he was so happy to make a connection! He started drooling from his nose from the excitement :) I love that he is so happy to be connecting to humans. Bodes well for our future relationship.
How did he do in the storm? Well, he hunkered down, and didn’t really come out from wherever he was till it started warming up again. We kept the barn door closed of course. I can’t say I wasn’t worried, I even told Todd, my husband, “what if he died?”. I did not want to go look for him as I didn’t want to scare him out of a place where he felt safe. Deep down I knew he was OK, and when he finally came out, he was absolutely fine and let me pet him again.
Astro on the deck where he loves to hang out a lot.
Beautiful frosty morning. Sometimes during the day, when the weather is a bit warmer, I see Astro all the way down to the edge of the forest, hunting.
Temperatures have gone up in the last week, and spring is already in the air. I predict Astro will be in the house, going in and out, by next winter. Now, if I can just tell the dogs that…..
