My cat, which I once thought was a male, had kittens not long ago. Of course, I figured out that it was a female long before it had kittens. Male cats don't get pregnant.

The cat, which was named, "Tom," but has since lost that name for a more feminine "Cat," is almost entirely black, with the exception of a small white area on its underside that isn't readily visible. I'm glad I'm not superstitious, since a black cat crosses my path nearly every day.

Cat came to live with me about a year ago as a small kitten. It was abandoned near the house and took up near the end of the road. Some fellows I hired to work on the road were trying to make it leave so they could work. The kitten kept trying to get under their machinery and would have been killed, but I felt sorry for it and took it home. It was sick, wormy and malnourished.

It soon recovered and I was pleased to find that we made a good match. Cat doesn't get around people very often, instead spending most of her time wandering through nearby fields and hills, chasing bugs and anything else that moves in the grass and tending to her last kitten. I did mention the kittens, didn't I? There were five of them, all different. One was all black, one was grey and white, one grey, tan and white, another all grey and the last was calico. We decided to keep the calico one to add to our cat collection. The second cat's name is Callie. We are an inventive bunch when it comes to making up names, aren't we?

I couldn't understand how a black cat could have so many differently colored kittens, but they were a wonder to behold. The first time they all wandered out from under the house to play beneath the purple butterfly bush, it looked like a pile of colored socks on the ground. Before the rest made it out, one kitten came out alone and stayed outside by itself for at least three days before the others found their way to the light. Almost as soon as it was stumbling around in the grass by the steps it started eating whatever scraps I put out for its mother.

Now, the last remaining kitten gets growled at if it gets too close to the food. The eating order is getting established early.

After having the urge to keep them all, I realized that the new kittens at my house needed a home, or more likely, homes.

The first kitten went to some of my friends from church, who saw them while visiting for supper. Kittens and puppies almost always sell themselves.

The second and third went to a friend here who has a young daughter and the fourth went to replace the first one. My church friends have three dogs, a bird, and two cats. They are real animal lovers. When they took the grey fluffy kitten, they immediately started feeding it special milk with an eye-dropper. It didn't matter that the kitten could eat hard cat food already by the time they took it. They fed it that way because they wanted to do it. While I didn't really get it, I suppose it was a bonding thing.

They also had it sleeping with them on the bed, which I also wouldn't go for. I haven't had a cat in my house in a long time. None of the ones at the house have ever seen the inside place where the people live.

However, the grey kitten found itself in harm's way when it escaped their home through an open door and was killed by a dog outside. Distraught and maybe even crying, the husband called to tell me about how upset his wife was. "We were up most of the night," he told me. They had a burial service with a shoebox in the back yard.

When I took them another kitten a couple of days later, his wife was still crying over the lost kitten. As he looked at her, tears welled up in his eyes as well. He is a compassionate fellow, I thought. "This one will never leave my sight," pledged the wife.

The other two kittens are also in a new home. Their owner informed me that one of them climbed her leg Monday morning as she went outside to take her daughter to the school bus. She removed the cat and put it down and it promptly climbed her other leg. She said she then gave in and gave it the attention it wanted. It must have taken after its father, that's all I can figure.

The one remaining is the most shy of the five, the one that is the least likely to get caught by children and the most likely to be a good mouser like its mother. Now that I know for sure that I have a female cat, I plan to have her 'fixed,' or spayed. I don't need kittens everywhere. After making that decision, a friend informed me that Callie is also a female.

When I asked how he could tell, he asked, "Have you ever met a man named Callie?"

"No, but I'd never met a female named Tom before now," I replied. He went on to inform me that all calico cats are female. Here we go again, I thought.

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