Sophie’s Story

How do you find a missing cat?

For two solid weeks – 15 days and 12 hours – we searched for Sophie. Frantic, furious, frustrated, and fearful, we couldn’t believe she was just gone. I couldn’t believe I allowed her to bound out the pet door into the wee hours of October 6.

Instead of grief, we were stuck between acceptance and fear. Still, during those 15 days, we refused to believe we’d never see her again. Early morning on October 6 simply couldn’t be the last time. We couldn’t give up.

Maybe you understand. Maybe you’ve lost a pet for an hour, a day, or worse. Maybe you wonder what to do. Maybe like me, you searched for hope and confirmation all over the web, hoping to find tips, commiseration, clues, or secrets. Maybe this story will help.

We sought opinions from anyone – neighbors, friends, vets, doctors and shelters. Just about everyone knew of someone – a friend of a friend or an  urban legend – who lost Mittens or Fluffy for two weeks, only to see the emaciated cat finally find its way home. These are the easy stories to remember. More stories of cats never seen again were no doubt too tough for owners or animal lovers to solemnly recall.

How, exactly, do you find a lost cat? You start somewhere. You hope you’re one of the good stories. You start by not giving up.

Day 1. Hunt. Buy a baby monitor. Tell everyone. Yell.

I called for Sophie at 7:30, my car running. I decided to work from home.

At 9 a.m., Sophie still wasn’t home. I hunted through our backyard, neighbor’s backyard, a wooded area, and under and inside all crevices immediately surrounding our home.

I used a flashlight, cat treats, and unabashedly slashed through branches and brushpiles. At noon, I called the Humane Society and Animal Control. My wife came home, and we both called and hunted around for Sophie. We hunted through their dumpsters, calling till our voices were hoarse.

That night, we traversed the neighborhood. We told more neighbors. Many were familiar with outgoing Franklin the Cat – but few had ever seen stealthful Sophie. Franklin, for his part, scratched and clawed the back fence, traipsing alongside me, meowing quietly, searching fro his friend. We looked like the world’s worst hunting team.

We bought a baby monitor, and placed it outside the pet door. If something approached, we’d hear it. Before bed, I set out some cheap, expired fish, and slept in a bedroll on our porch. I heard nothing.

DAY 2. Flyers and searches.

The fish stayed intact during my 4 a.m. walk through the neighborhood.

We printed color flyers (don’t use black and white) featuring Sophie, promising a reward, and distributed to a 6-block radius, including fraternities, sororities, and two apartment complexes (Go KU!) I searched the neighborhood with a flashlight till 10 p.m., softly calling Sophie’s name.

Franklin expanded his territory to search. He ventured outside his normal roaming area. Inside a window well of a vacant home for sale, I found some feces. (Gross, I know.) But I clean up Sophie’s litter box. It looked familiar (Eww.). It was hers, right?

At 3:45 a.m., something gobbled the fish outside the porch. A possum.

DAY 3. Online Search. The shelter.

More fliers. More neighbors. More searching during the day. More research.

Sophie’s alert was now on Craiglist, Lawrence Journal-World online, Twitter in print, and other various pet sites. We alerted her microchip company.

I went to the Humane Society for the first time, you know, just in case. While there, I filed a “more permanent” report. She wasn’t there. Pain is walking through a room of caged, helpless cats with no homes. Agony is when Sophie isn’t there.

The Humane Society attendant politely told me about Lawrence’s leash laws. For a cat, it meant even with a collar, if he/she wandered off your property, it was technically a stray. She told me I’d probably be issued a ticket for negligence, you know, if Sophie was found.

I did not punch her in the face. In the next few days, other Humane Society reps were much more helpful.

DAY 3-4. The tips.

We got our first tips. First, the sighting of a grey neighbor cat. Secondly, two sightings of a friendly blue tortie that was nearly Sophie’s twin. Her owner proudly boasted of four other cats roaming the neighborhood sans collars. We got six more calls about this cat in the next 10 days.

Across the street, our first valuable tip: A visiting couple saw a gray cat in their parents’ lush, overgrown yard, resembling Sophie. They were certain – even adamant – it was her. They remembered her purple collar. They described the cat as “fast.” That was key. Sophie is fast – you’d describe her as fast if you saw her. It’s almost ridiculous.

I staked out the yard clad in all-black, with wet cat food, a flashlight and a lawnchair. A black stray approached, but nothing else. During the next ten days, I baited their yard, and spent at least 15 minutes in the lawn each morning, just in case.

Our next tip arrived from a sorority. (Shut up.) She described the meow to a “T” – a shrill and bizarre cry that sounded more like a person mimicking a cat. That’s Sophie. Fast and with a distinct, phony meow.

They actually had her nabbed for a couple minutes, before the scared cat escaped. We searched, but she was gone. Around midnight, another sorority called, after chasing a gray cat into brush. We found this guy – a gray-and-white longhair living around the sorority/fraternity parking lot.

Day 4. The morning bait. The strays. The stakeouts.

On my birthday, mornings began at 4 a.m., canvassing our territory, especially the neighbor’s yard and the sorority parking lots, softly calling for Sophie.

I began setting traps using canned tuna. My “traps” actually consisted of just me, monitoring the tuna (or cat treats, or catnip), waiting as I circled the neighborhood. Often the tuna disappeared within 15 minutes. I was always encouraged, even if I found nothing, or found just a possum, or found just the gray and white cat.

DAY 5.

Another trip to the Humane Society, where a shelter director told me about a family who visited daily for three weeks looking for a cat. Then they quit. A week later, the lost kitty showed up, emaciated, looking for food. They say cats are almost always “underground” – so close by, so frightened that you have to unturn every single stone. I cannot find Sophie. I begin to wonder about a coyote.

DAY 8. Petty B&E.

Columbus Day, another tip, but not a credible one. Today it rained and got cold for the first time.

Today I broke into two fenced yards and crawled under a neighbor’s porch (Sorry). I left a note ordering a rental house to open the garage. A fraternity guy stopped me in the parking lot. I wore all black and swung a flashlight. I looked like a burglar. I am coming apart at the seams.

DAY 11. Another tip.

Another tip, from a family outside our search range, but near my normal stakeout spot.

A gray cat has been snacking on their porch. I rush over to the house. The cat’s there, hungry, crying, but It isn’t Sophie – it’s yet another unfamiliar, gray stray. Skinny and fearful, the family tells me I can take the cat. I briefly think about it, but instead just feel terrible for lost cats, hungry and alone. My wife was sure this was real – we hadn’t received a tip in a while, and it just “felt like” something different. But no.

DAY 12. The bird sanctuary. The possum.

This day was unseasonably hot, but I trek into an overgrown bird sanctuary and hack through brush anyway.

I’ve convinced myself one of our area strays always takes the tuna, so tonight, I stay up. When I hear gobbling on the monitor, I rush to the pet door.

Apparently, as a cat hunter, I’m quite good at catching possums. This is over, I think, for the first time.

DAY 13. The final tip.

A knock at my door brings a strange tip, from a cat-loving family down the road. They actually relay a tip from an elderly couple, just outside the flier range, and through a park. They saw an unfamiliar cat across the street, poking through a gutter, lapping water.

I immediately take tuna over to the brush area, a curbside parkway buttressing two rental homes, unkempt but not big. I visit with the couple. This description actually resembles Sophie. She’s grey at first glance, but easy to mistake as almost black or orange. The couple claimed she was fast. My hope – almost gone – is still intact.

DAY 15. Acceptance?

I write my “sort-of” farewell piece to my missing cat. I listen to Speed of Sound about 100 times. I’m overnight in Salina, Kansas on business. My phone rings at 12:30.

It’s my wife.

She went to bed at 11:30. At midnight, Franklin, agitated, began leaping up and down from the bed. He grunted and meowed at the outside. Then, he leaped into the windowsill, peering into the yard. My wife wakes up.

Then she hears rustling in the baby monitor. She thinks she hears a meow. She puts on her glasses, and in the full-moon night, through the window, she sees something sprint through the back yard.

She rushes through the house, frantic, to the breezeway, flashlight in tow. Franklin follows. In the breezeway, she hears the almost-phony, contrived meow.

Outside, Sophie finally paws the pet door, looking up, meowing loudly. Incessantly. She had found home – meowing in triumph, not terror.

Her collar is missing. She is unhurt. Her fur is not matted, she doesn’t appear to have lost weight. Was she stuck in a garage? Did someone take her? Was she simply roaming, lost, wayward?

We don’t know. But she’s home.

This is probably more info than you could possibly want. But if you’re ever searching for a pet, you know how this feels. Don’t give up hope. Flyers work. Craigslist works. The baby monitor also turned out to be a godsend. The Humane Society and Animal Control will help. Neighbors are largely good – tell them about your situation. Don’t be shy, and for crying out loud, don’t stop your search. Even if a missing cat senses you waiting in the yard, it won’t come out. It is hiding, in survival mode.

Cats come out most often between 2-4 a.m in theory. But a frightened cat will adjust its schedule based on animal and human traffic. If, for example, your neighborhood is rife with strays, the estranged cat will adjust its schedule to avoid them. Don’t be afraid to call the name – even if you’re just talking. If he or she is close, they will hear.

For me, the morning walks proved cathartic. At least I was doing “something” – even if my search was fruitless. If I stopped searching, would Sophie have come back? I don’t know. If I had stopped searching, I would have had to confront the obvious, and give up. I couldn’t do that.

You shouldn’t either.