< by Swede, a very articulate house cat >

They told me I was thrown out of a car on one of the coldest nights in January in Minnesota. I walked in the ditch near the highway for what seemed like hours until another car stopped and picked me up and took me to a cat shelter. I had significant frostbite, which would ultimately take the tips of my ears and my tail. I felt awful. Why didn’t they want me? One Saturday, the shelter loaded me, and many of my catmates, into cages and took us to this store called Petco. They told us people would come and adopt us.

I sat in that cage and one by one my friends were adopted. It was nearly the end of the day when an older woman came in and looked at all the cats and then I heard her say, “I’d like to see that one.” It was ME she wanted to see. Really? Me? They took me out and handed me to her and she just enveloped me with her love. She held me so perfectly and I could feel her heart beating and I couldn’t help myself — I just started purring right then and there.

Here I was, a 20-pound big boy cat purring like a little infant. I just couldn’t help it. I didn’t care if I ever ate or drank a thing again — all I wanted was for her to hold me like this for the rest of my life.

She adopted me that day, named me Swede, and took me to a beautiful home where I can sleep anywhere I want. The best room is the porch — it has heated floors and floor-to-ceiling windows so I can see the birds, squirrels, deer, and turkeys.

I love it here — especially when my mom picks me up like that first day and calls me her “big little Swedish boy.”

I think my human parents think “outside the box” so I decided to poop “outside the box” and my Mom didn’t like that very much and told me so. I’ve been much better about that lately.