The Secrets of Lost Cats: One Woman, Twenty Posters, and a New Understanding of Love

INTRODUCTION

We’ve all seen them. Hanging on telephone poles, mailboxes, and posted on the bulletin boards of our local supermarkets. LOST! REWARD! HAVE YOU SEEN JOEY? The blaring headlines of the lost-cat poster call to us, as does the picture of Joey stretched out asleep on the living room rug, vulnerable belly exposed, feet suspended in the air. The caption underneath the picture offers a sliver of information yet somehow says it all: Friendly. Loud meower. Likes treats. Owner heartbroken. Most of us feel pangs for the missing cat and the distraught owner. Where could Joey be? Is he hiding or lost? Is he hurt or sick?

A lost-cat poster tells the beginning of a story. But only the beginning. Most of us—at least those of us who love animals and mysteries—want to know more. We have a desire to fill in the blanks, a need to understand a story that is, to us, unknown. What happened? Why did Joey vanish? Will the missing cat and the anxious owner reunite? Will there be a happy ending? Although our questions are rarely—if ever—answered, the public’s role in the unfolding drama is anything but a mystery. Frantic cat owners rely upon hundreds and possibly thousands of deputy searchers to be on the lookout for their missing kitty, phoning in possible sightings or tips. We become part of the rescue team. We become detectives.

A lost-cat poster is, in effect, an invitation to care about a missing loved one. Our busy, task-filled day has been interrupted by a stranger’s vulnerability. Love has gone missing.

I’ve been on both sides of a lost-cat poster. I know firsthand all the feelings an owner pours into making one. When my cat, Zak, disappeared, I had to make my very own poster. I was desperate. I searched for my orange tabby everywhere: schoolyards, side streets, parked cars, garbage cans. Rambling through a neighbor’s yard on one moonless night, I accidentally tripped their security system and found myself blinded by floodlights while a very large and upset homeowner ran toward me.

"I’m only looking for my cat. Honest!" I explain.

At the time, I was living in New Haven, Connecticut, a small city filled with nineteenth-century houses clustered around Yale University’s sprawling campus. I worked at home as a psychotherapist and Zak, my big orange tabby, spent a lot of time with me during the day. He liked to go hunting after hours, but I could always count on him to come home during the late-night talk shows, or at least by infomercial time. But one fateful night he never showed up, and he forgot all about breakfast—which was sacred to us.

He’ll come home soon, I told myself. He’ll come trotting in with a mouse that he’ll drop proudly at my feet.

The day wasted away and by evening, I stalked the neighborhood with my flashlight. When midnight hit, I was sitting on the porch, waiting, hoping that silence, patience, and a steady gaze at the sidewalk would prove more effective. Eventually I went to bed, but sleep was ragged. I strained to hear Zak’s signal—one paw banging against my bedroom window.

I wondered if I was to blame. Maybe I’d given Zak too much freedom? Or maybe my love wasn’t enough and he’d found a better deal somewhere else? My rational self disagreed. Where could he get a better deal? I feed him real albacore tuna!

The next morning, I had to accept the truth. Zak was missing. His disappearance was officially an emergency. A breath crawled out of my tight chest. So many thoughts and feelings erupted.

Helpless: This can’t be true.

Overwhelmed: Where do I start?

Fear: I don’t want to feel this pain.

Doom: Will I ever see my sweet boy again?

One loss has a way of reactivating the memories of other losses. I felt the past creeping up, with the memory of lost loved ones. I refused to revisit this excruciating feeling of abandonment. I had to fight it. I had to find Zak.

This time I had a chance—maybe I could find the one I loved. I drew in a deeper breath. Zak was smart, and he’d only been missing a day. I still had a chance to find him. I raced into my office and drew up several prototypes of lost-cat posters. I didn’t know which words to use. HELP! summarized my need, but its message seemed vague. I’m a mess would be accurate, but not strategic. I felt frustrated, but I tried to hurry. Zak disappeared before smartphones and instant photographs were ubiquitous. Instead I drew a picture of him, with a hint of a smile. He was a happy cat. I experimented with the captions: Missing Cat, Last Seen—before finally settling on the true simplicity of our situation—LOST. Zak and me.

I went out on the street carrying a stack of posters. As I hammered, people stopped to offer sympathy. I hope you find your kitty, one lady said. A couple walking by offered, Good luck, and You’ll find him. After I had put up the posters—I started with twenty—I went home. I slouched in a chair by the phone, and waited for the world—or some divinity—to intervene. An hour later, I was back on the street. Active anxiety seemed more heroic than waiting.

The next day, while I was out searching, an earnest young man called and left a message:

My wife and I saw an orange tabby that looked like yours, around midnight, two days ago, in the garden by the Polish church on State Street. I couldn’t get close because he was wild and snarly. I hope this helps. Good luck!

Was it helpful? Let’s see. Over forty-eight hours ago they saw a deranged, orange cat at midnight in the garden of good and evil. Honestly, it wasn’t what I wanted to hear, and there was no return phone number. Nevertheless, I hurried over to trespass on the church grounds, afraid that my sweet kitty, who usually said hello by licking my nose, had been transformed into a feral vampire cat. While searching the churchyard, I stopped to gaze at a ten-foot-tall statue of Saint-I-Have-No-Idea and suddenly thought: Zak is a lapsed Jew with Buddhist tendencies. He is so not here.

On the walk home I began to wonder about other cat owners. Were they able to laugh at themselves like I was? And how did they end up finding their cats? I was thankful that, as a psychotherapist in private practice, I had a flexible work schedule, but what about cat owners who punched a clock? Instead of searching for their missing cats, they were trapped at work. Were friends and relatives helping them?

How many empathetic phone calls did they get? I had received about fifteen—strangers, each and every one of them—from people who wished me good luck, even though they didn’t have any information to pass along. Each time I hit the playback button, I decided that this would be the one pinpointing Zak’s location.

When I finally arrived home, the house felt empty and lonely. Tears rolled down my face. I couldn’t think about other cat owners. I had to find my cat.

Searching for Zak changed my life. I became acutely and permanently aware of lost-cat posters. I saw them everywhere—in my hometown, on the streets surrounding my office in Manhattan, all across the country, even on vacation in Europe. They were on lampposts, in my local deli, at the post office, and on gas station walls. One was even tacked onto a tree outside my living room window.

I lingered in front of them, studying their composition. All of them made me feel empathic, but some posters made me smile, too. A photograph captured the image of a tiny kitten being groomed by her mother’s tongue. One man drew a picture of a black cat and wrote, We love him. I discovered twins. Two brothers both had similar dark markings around their eyes; named respectively, the Lone Ranger and Tonto.

One day, I impulsively took a poster home—it had a picture of a red Abyssinian named Lilly. Soon, there was no denying it. I was out and out collecting lost-cat posters (I’d make sure there were duplicates posted nearby, or I’d Xerox one in a nearby copy shop and put the original back where I found it). In part, I was drawn to their folk art quality, but mostly I was intrigued by the messages themselves. I wondered why some owners included extraneous information. It made sense to list the cat’s color or personality traits or home address, but the cat’s birthday? What were we supposed to do? Send a card?

Eventually, it occurred to me that each owner—knowingly or unknowingly—felt compelled to tell a story.

Family heartbroken …

Owner desperate …

Cat needs medication …

Other cats miss him …

Some posters looked like they came right out of the family photo album. You could see young kids in the pictures. A kitchen table. Others seemed put together in great haste. Some were accompanied by beautiful drawings; others were text only. A few read like poems.

Gradually, my desire to collect lost-cat posters came into focus. I wanted to find out about the cats but I also wanted to know who the cats were leaving behind. The posters became a portal into the subculture of lost-cat owners; the phone numbers the entry point and the means to pass through. I’d call and introduce myself, ask a few questions, empathize, and say, Thank you. I’d be an armchair Nancy Drew with a specialty, I mulled over my title—Lost-Cat Detective, or possibly Cat-Poster Sleuth.

But when it came to making the first phone call, Nancy Drew’s confidence wavered. The last thing I wanted to do was give someone false hope. What if the owner felt intruded upon? Feeling shy, I dialed the number on Lilly’s poster. A young woman answered the phone. I introduced myself by saying, I’m a cat lover who writes about lost and found cats and I hope you… but she cut me off mid-sentence.

"Oh, it’s such a bizarre story," she said, bursting with enthusiasm.

In those halcyon days at the beginning of my journey, it really was that simple. Most of the stories that I heard were hilarious—even the melancholy ones had their moments of lightness. But as my collection grew, the stories became more complex, and sometimes sadly dark. Lost-cat owners seemed to be like protagonists trapped inside a film noir. Left to rely on dead-end clues, intuition, and guts, how could they escape? Nancy Drew tugged on her fedora.

I realized that cats could vanish innocently or as a result of malice. The animal’s character, personality, and temperament influenced the nature of an owner’s search—the when, the where, and the how long. My curiosity exploded. Owners were under constant pressure to make the right decision. Should they exercise caution or take a risk? I searched in an area where drug dealers hang out. Stay patient or be impulsive? I was so happy to see my cat that I ran toward her, but she got scared and ran into the woods.

Conversations with the cat owners and my clients seemed strikingly similar. Although I didn’t introduce myself as a therapist, I was startled when owners asked me for advice. (Do you believe in dreams?) Some of my friends wanted to know if I was doing pro bono therapy. I didn’t know what to tell them. The doctor in me couldn’t help but notice that talking with owners about their missing (and even found) cats was ultimately a conversation about the loss of control. (I don’t know whether to get my daughter a new kitten, or hold out for Lilly’s return. "Even if your gut tells you it’s not your cat, how can you not leave work, not go check out a lead? If I stop looking, it’s like admitting he’s dead. No one cares, except me.")

*   *   *

The process of searching for a lost cat and the process of therapy can be likened to an odyssey. By definition, an odyssey is filled with darkness, confusion, and obstacles, where turning back is no longer an option. In order to move forward, we must summon bravery, determination, inventiveness, resilience, faith, and forgiveness. Hope matters deeply. At the end of the journey, we see the world—and ourselves—differently.

We may discover that there are many types of happy endings. One cat owner said, I lost my cat, but gained a community, and I observed my clients addressing similar journeys in their lives—without having lost their cats. (I lost my dad, but I met all the people he was closest to.)

For seven years, I followed where my curiosity led me. I’d unintentionally discovered—like any heroine searching for something outside of her sunlit and shadowed self—an unfinished epic of my own. At the end of my odyssey I felt changed as a human being, a cat owner, a family member, and a psychotherapist. As Rilke said, Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves.

There is a question about love that grips most of us—animal lovers or not. We react to it constantly, although not always consciously. When we become aware of its presence we typically feel passionate, if not conflicted, about how well we’re answering the question in our own lives. It’s haunting us, always slumbering in our consciousness, never leaving our hearts, ever present in therapy.

What would you do for love?

Some of us begin by making a lost-cat poster.

ZAK

Five days after Zak’s disappearance, I’d learned nothing as to his whereabouts. People had called to wish me luck—but no one in the neighborhood had seen Zak. Not even Old Man Tony, who sat on his porch steps every day overseeing the comings and goings on the street. Eddie didn’t know, either. Eddie was the developmentally disabled man who lived with his mother across the street. Middle-aged but spry, he used to put Zak in his bicycle basket and ride with him around the block. Zak liked it, but after I saw Eddie pedaling away from our street with my cat at the helm, I had to stop the carnival ride.

I knew that my best hope for finding Zak rested on the foottraffic flow of strangers who may or may not stop to read my lost-cat poster, my own plea for help. But what were the statistics on finding your missing cat? I had no idea, but I wanted to give Zak the best possible odds. So when I searched for him—and I searched every day—I carried extra posters and a staple gun. A previously unexplored street would soon have a set of posters with Zak’s handsome face tacked to streetlights—on each side of the street. I wasn’t leaving anything to chance.

During my search, I quickly discovered my psychological borders—what I considered my emotional-neighborhood turf. We all have these emotional maps, whether we realize it or not. We’ll go to this convenience store, not that one. We’ll buy our coffee here, not there. We won’t cross at these lights, preferring instead the block ahead. It’s simple, really. We feel more comfortable in some places than others. Surely that must be true for animals, too. I thought about that as I continued to search for Zak. If he has to be missing, I reasoned, then at least let me find him on a street that felt soothing, a friendly looking street. As crazy as it sounds, I wanted Zak to feel comforted. Maybe on a nice street he’d feel less lonely.

Yes, I anthropomorphized that Zak had human feelings—mine. I knew the difference between his core animal needs and my human ones, but intellect couldn’t stop my worries. I wished I could send a message through mental telepathy. At least he’d know that I was frantically looking for him.

After five days of searching I understood the importance of the elements. Rain, in particular, posed a threat. Besides worrying that my posters would disintegrate, I worried that Zak was wet and cold. It had rained that morning, so I was out checking the telephone poles to see which posters had survived. Some were perfectly intact, while others were left dangling by a staple. A few had been so ravaged that Zak’s likeness resembled an Impressionist painting gone soggy.

I had to get to work. The sun pushing through the clouds meant that people would soon be traveling on the sidewalks, and perhaps stopping to read my posters—a crayon drawing of an orange cat. SOS.

Nothing worked. The hours drummed by; days and nights passed of not knowing. Dread walked with me. Five days after his disappearance, I gave in. I picked up the phone.

Hello, do you find lost pets? Could I hire you? My cat is missing.

I heard silence, followed by the click of a lighter and a long, breathy inhalation of smoke. Then the deep, raspy voice of an elderly woman who’d obviously downed some gin in her day replied: He’s alive! She exhaled.

My nightmare was over?

Really! Really? How do you know? I was feeling the surge of relief, but I wasn’t going to be totally taken in. I had my suspicions.

He’s a beautiful, big cat … orange. She took another drag from her cigarette. Bushy tail. How did she get his coloring right? How did she know that he was handsome? Pride swooped in. Zak was alive and still good looking.

He’s been gone five days, I said.

There’s a neighborhood kid. Exhale. A young boy. He knows.

My heart sank. The strange kid next door, I said. But they’re away. Nobody’s seen them for days.

Very friendly, handsome.

Yeah, that’s Zaky. Did the boy do something to him?

The little boy knows.

Is there something else I should know?

The boy knows. Inhale.

Okay, okay. What do I owe you?

Nothing.

Click.

I’d made the call after my vision cleared. I’d been at my desk crying when I saw the psychic’s card lying on top of Zak’s posters. I had to decide whether contacting the psychic was brilliant or insane. Brilliant meant that I had faith in my ability to think outside the box. Insane meant that I was desperate to believe in magic. It also made me vulnerable to a con job. It’s not that I’m against creative solutions, but in this case it was the source of the suggestion—a client—who gave me