The kitten died. Randomly, suddenly, unexpectedly. He was fine at breakfast and sometime before lunch on Sunday he was gone (he was still at my parents’ place). All the other kittens are fine; it was just that kitten.
I had finally prodded Travis to the point where he was willing to consider bringing a kitten home if I could show him a plan to keep the kitten from ending up in Sadie’s mouth. I scoured the internet (no small feat – did you know there are still people who believe rubbing your animal’s nose in a mess is considered good training?) and looked for advice and tried to piece it all together into something that would work for us. Earlier that morning, I had just submitted my Husky/Kitten Integration Plan to Travis and he agreed that it might just work. I was confident that our sweet-but-dumb, high-prey-drive Sadie would not eat the new kitten. It was all going to work; we’d have a fluffy kitten in the house who would turn into a beautiful, friendly cat.
We had plans to take a motorcycle ride that day. We were checking tire pressures, warming up the engines, and cleaning the visors when my mom called. One little phone call to throw off the rest of the day. I thought I was okay, but as soon as I told Travis, I started bawling. Like, all-out tears-rolling-down crying and sobbing. Turns out, getting on a motorcycle is not the safest thing to do when you are so sad you can’t think straight.
I cried for the little kitten who didn’t get a chance to be a cat. I cried at the disappointment of not getting to bring a kitten home. I cried at the frustration of working so hard to put together a plan and then having the actual cat part of the plan go kaput. I cried for the cat who never got to be mine. I’m pretty sure I also said, “This is not fair.”
All this for a kitten I’d seen twice. It may seem silly and unwarranted, but I was just heartbroken. I just really wanted that kitten. We never even got to name him.
I still want a cat. I figure we have 20 years before we end up traveling the country in a motor home, which seems like plenty of time to have one cat. But I’m not going to look for one. When the time is right, when the cat is right, we’ll find it.
Three Dog Kitchen 
Oh dear, how sad. I’m so sorry. I would have been bawling too. There are always kittens and cats that need homes, so when you’re ready I’m sure you’ll find the right one, before you even start looking.
This is the first post I saw on your site…. I was in the search of food but oh well… We found a cat in the middle of the road once. He wanted to die. He didn’t want to move, had no tags, no claws, and wasn’t going to make it, so we scooped him up and took him to the Humane Society, and told them that if they didn’t find the owner we’d take him. Of course they are a big bureaucracy, and the next time I called they had put him down. I brawled my eyes out.
And 4 weeks later a little kitten, starved to near death, and looking like the cat that we had found, walked up to me, complaining loudly and not leaving my side. It’s 12 years later, he’s still complaining loudly, but not starved anymore.
I’m sure your cat will find you when you’re ready.