A month or two into training Francis to walk on his leash, I took him outside for the 3rd time ever along with my friend, his other mom. At first, we opened the door not realizing someone was doing laundry in the basement. He heard the noise and said, “No thanks, I’ll stay inside for now.”
A few minutes later, the coast was clear and we took him into the stairwell. 3 other apartments have back doors that open onto this stairwell, so it really is amazing that no one had come out before just to take out their trash or something. We were past all the apartment doors on the last flight of steps before the door to the great outdoors when one of my neighbors came out with her cat.
This neighbor is a Nebby Debbie like you wouldn’t believe, a classic knows-all-the-gossip neighbor, really. She claimed to be checking on her niece who was supposedly in the basement. We, of course, were sure the basement was empty. While it’s entirely likely that she was holding the cat because the cat wanted out the back door and she needed to restrain him, I sincerely doubt this is the case. She’s just the sort of odd-ball who would want to have our cats become friends and go on kitten play dates. But her cat is obviously not a very friendly animal because he gave our Francis the stink eye pretty hard. Now, Francis does not scare easily, and he loves fellow fluffy things as he demonstrates by following my parents’ cats around their house despite repeatedly being hissed at by the older ladies. The fact that his best friend is a dog attests to his fearless, friendly nature. But the neighbor cat got his goat in a big way, probably because his moms were clearly freaked out by the incident too.
Nebby Debbie and her devil cat went back home pretty quickly once they realized they weren’t welcome. As soon as their door shut, Francis ran back home himself, barely pausing to investigate the devil cat’s yowling on the other side of the door as he passed.
We gave him a rest while we went out for ice cream, and an hour later, we tried taking him out for a 3rd time. But the back stairs were ruined, he was not about to risk another encounter with the neighbors. So we took him down the front stairs, an area he’d visited frequently, but never while harnessed and leashed. We got him down the stairs and into the doorway quickly. Then we hung out on the stoop with him for what seemed an eternity compared to how quickly he ventures about behind the building. Finally, we got him exploring all the way to the building next door and all seemed well.
Eventually, he decided to make his way back to our own stoop where he began a close examination of the bushes while I sat on the stoop holding his leash. Then disaster struck. A young kid came by and very quietly entered the building. My best guess is that he sneaked by so quietly and Francis was so engrossed, that the gust of wind produced by the door silently falling shut was the most sudden, unexpected, terrifying thing the little man had ever experienced. He bolted. Out of fear that he’d be injured if I held the leash, I let it go, hoping that we could grab him as he exited the bush. But he was too fast. At first, I headed for a bush around the corner that he had already explored, but he pivoted very suddenly and came back around. Then he ran across the street (luckily we live in a very low traffic area), up the hill, and into the courtyard of another set of buildings.
We agreed not to run after him as this would only cause him to keep running. He was clearly looking for the closest, safest hiding place, so we just needed to follow him slowly and calmly. We lost sight of him, but a guy on the hill said, “your cat ran that way.” There was another guy in the courtyard, stooping over a bush in the corner and cooing to Francis who was cowering inside it. Mom #2 crawled into the bush and carried him out. He was very happy to be carried back home.
On our way back, an old man on a stoop (and former owner of a cat who walked on a leash) advised us to be patient with him.
Once we were inside our building and Francis saw his own apartment door, he struggled out of his mom’s hands, giving her some serious scratches (I’d pay good money, if I had it, to know what my not nebby neighbors thought of the scream, “My face!” just outside their apartment door), and ran to salvation. As soon as he was back inside, he sprawled out on the floor, king of the castle style, as if nothing horrible had just happened. The only unsettling bit for him at that point was that I kept following him around with a wet paper towel. He finally let me get a proper look and clean the mud off the only wound he sustained in the whole ordeal: he ripped a claw off his one back paw. Meanwhile, his other mom was in the bathroom puzzling out how to bandage the scratch directly under her eye.
We sat down for a drink and some Phineas and Ferb to settle our nerves before calling it a night.
So now that you know a horror story from the harness training front, take some time learn from the experience. I’ve vowed to never take Francis out the front door again—the back door has no bushes around it and the area in general is wide open, so no one can catch Francis unawares. The other thing I realized as I thought back on the ordeal was that I could have done more to keep Francis alert to his surroundings so he wouldn’t freak out when something new and unexpected happened. If I had periodically said his name or kissed to him so that he would turn and look at me while exploring the bush, especially as the kid came up to the door, he would have been alert to the situation and maybe we could have moved away in a more controlled manner. Sitting calmly as someone passes by might work in dog leash training, but it does not work for cats.
Stuck under a Cat 