The Story of Custard (part 1)

(Custard, the great orange kitty, left us on October 31 just short of his 19th birthday. I will post about him a few times this month.)

The Story of Custard (part1)

In 1995 a man named Joe boarded a cat with us. The cat, named Custer (like the Little Big Horn general), was a gift from his children to keep him company. But he traveled a lot and didn't really like the cat so he offered me $50 to find him a home. I got to liking him and so we took him, and the $50. We renamed him Custard.

He lived the first portion of his life upstairs, where Katie the Doberman wouldn't go. Katie wasn't a terror to all the cats, but for some reason Custard couldn't get comfortable with her. When Katie died, Custard thought his luck had changed but we got another Doberman, Kendall, who took over the role of Custard tormentor. 

Custard really wanted to come downstairs, and whenever we put the dog in her crate he would join us. When we began to crate Kendall less and less, she would sleep on the couch, and Custard would creep down the stairs, peek at Kendall on the couch, and sneak over to us, never failing to have an eye or an ear or a whisker tuned to the dog. Kendall knew the game too. Invariably she would pop open an eye, then leap off the couch just as Custard flew back up the stairs. 

Kendall lived a relatively short life and we got yet another Doberman, Titus (Ty), who didn't give off the same threatening vibe as the previous two. It didn't take Custard long to figure out that Ty was just a big loveable galoot, and Custard became a full time downstairs cat. This is when he really started to shine.

Custard loved people. He loved being held and he loved sleeping in laps. He also loved people food, often staring at us during dinner, begrudging our every bite. He was vocal, chirping whenever you entered a room, said his name, or woke him up with a pat on the head. And his purring machine started the moment you picked him up.

Titus also died young and I like to think that Custard was proud to have outlived three Dobermans. We stopped getting Dobermans, and maybe part of that was that we didn't want Custard to have to go back upstairs if it turned out to be like the first two. But even though we have two (very cat-friendly) dogs, and two other cats, this was Custard's house for a long time, and I'm glad he lived long enough to enjoy it.