Visit From An Old Friend

Well, wonders never cease.  Dave took me out to eat today, and over to our new yarn store to spend the rest of my Christmas money.  We got home somewhere between two and three, which is the time I feed my cats their daily canned food treat.  As I was gathering bowls together, I glanced out the back window, and I couldn't believe my eyes.  Ms Grey, one of the ferals cats that lived here when I first married, was eating at my dry food tray.  Wow!  She was one of my trap savvy cats, and very hard to catch.  She had two litters each year, making her responcible for half my herd, but we finally caught her. 
It was February of 2006.  I guess she'd been eating somebody's leftovers, because she had somehow gotten a chicken bone stuck in her back teeth, which made it impossible for her to close her mouth.  At the time I didn't know it was a chicken bone, I just knew she couldn't close her mouth.  I desparately tried to catch her for a whole two weeks, then an idea hit me.  I began to notice that she had been eating mostly canned food because dry food or lunch meat fell right out of her mouth.  I placed a bowl of canned food inside the pet carrier.  When she went in after it, I closed the door.  Knowing she'd never let our vet examine her, I asked the spay/neuter clinic if they check her mouth after they put her under.  When I picked her up the next day, they informed me that she'd had a chicken bone stuck in her back teeth. They had removed it, and she was fine.  I borrowed a dog kennel from my Dad to keep her contained while I gave her antibiotics.  I had to mix it with her food, and I couldn't have kept her food separate if she'd been set free.  I released her as soon as I could. 
I was a little scared she'd run away in anger, and never come back, but she didn't.  She remained a part of the colony for another year.  It was about that time, when a large male cat wondered up.  He was very dominate, and chased away several of my cats, including her.  He was as sweet as could be to people, but he was a bully to other cats.  After he was neutered, he calmed down, but by then she had left to find a less cranky territory.  I'd see her occasionally, but she never stayed.  Eventually, she stopped coming around.
Seeing her today was like a ray of light in a dark period of my life.  She is more skittish, but she didn't run away when I took out the canned food.  She wouldn't allow me to pet her, but that's pretty normal for her.  I did touch her a time or two while she was preoccupied with food.  She must have a regular source of food, because she didn't seem to be overly thin.  Her hair is thinning in areas where I noticed some scaly skin patches, Which looks to me like dermatitis caused by flea allergy.  I once had a cat that developed this allergy, and it looked exactly like what I saw on Ms Grey.
I'm still mourning my losses, but seeing Ms Grey somewhat eased that pain.  She was here from the very beginning in 2002, and even though she was young then, she was grown up enough to have kittens. If she's still alive at her age, I have to believe some of the others are out there somewhere as well.  Maybe our paths will someday cross again.