CAT-astrophe

when i come home from work, one of two things normally happen; lulu comes running out from under the bed/chair/couch she's been hiding under and says hello, or i go outside and call her and she comes running from the car/bush/camp chair she's been hiding under to say hello.  either way, i can count on kitten headbutts and chit chat* when i get home.  last night, she was not home.  no big deal, i thought she'd come home around dinner time for a check in.  i mean, she always checks in, even if she stays out all night.  she likes when we're all home and hanging out, and revels in the attention we all lavish on her.  i went to bed at 11, and she still wasn't home. i started to get worried because i guess at heart i really am a crazy cat lady, and then sometime around midnight D and the girlchild woke me up to tell me she was home and bring her to bed so i could see her.  i was soooo relieved.  i mean, i know she's a grown-ass cat and can handle herself (the notch in her ear proves it), and that there was a good chance she was just out having kitten adventures, but still.  all i could think of was my poor kitten, smooshed by a car.  today my stepdaughter and i had this conversation via text;

me: i would have cried so much!

girlchild: we all would have.

me: i guess then we could have shaved our eyebrows** all together, though.

girlchild: haha, ya.

me: we would have been a weird looking family for a while.

girlchild: ya, but it would be fun to see who grew their eyebrows back first.

so i guess i was the only seriously worried one, but we were all happy to see her little kitten face at the door last night.

*i like to have one-way conversations with the cat where i ask her about her day and she says nothing.

**when the boychik was 9, his cat died, and he read that the egyptians shaved their eyebrows as a sign of mourning, so D let him shave his off.  it's one of the sweetest stories i have ever heard.