Aunt Gloria

This morning my cat leapt onto the kitchen counter as I was warming milk for my coffee. I thought of my Aunt Gloria who gave me my first cat when I was nine. She was a shiny black cat with a two inch tail. We named her Midnight. She was super sweet and loved to rub up against us and she loved to be petted. I saw photos at Grandma's of Aunt Gloria when she was young. She was so beautiful. She had an amazing smile like Grandpa, and glorious wavy red hair. "So troubled," my grandmother would say. Aunt Gloria would scan the newspapers for cats that needed homes and adopt them. She fed her cats even after she had stopped feeding herself. She was found dead and emaciated in her apartment full of cats.