The Power of a Hand Written Letter

A few weeks ago, we had a feline visitor in our backyard. At first he was pretty skittish, and was hiding in our bushes. Then he got a bit more brave and came up to our back sliding door a couple of times. I got a good look at him, and just knew that he was an indoor kitty. I could just tell that he belonged to someone and had accidentally gotten outside. Since I was working and was super busy, and we have a lot of kitty visitors, I didn’t do anything about it at first.

However, when the kitty showed up for about the fourth day in a row, and stayed all day curled up next to our window, I decided something had to be done. Despite the fact that Nathan instructed me not to feed the cat, I did so anyway. He kept trying to come inside, but I never let him in. For the next two days I was never home when the shelter was open so I couldn’t take him in to see if he was micro-chipped. I fed the kitty, and he pretty much never left our back deck.

Finally, I got home with just a few minutes to spare, and raced the kitty to the shelter. He, of course, did not have a micro-chip, but I left him there anyway just in case his owner was looking for him. He was such a sweet little guy that I had a lot of anxiety leaving him there.

Over the next couple of weeks I often wondered about the kitty. Especially when we drove past the shelter. I even thought of stopping by to see if he was still there.

A few days ago, I got this little gem in the mail:

I couldn’t believe it when I opened this card. I was so excited to see that the kitty had found his home. The fact that someone had taken just a few minutes to write a note of thanks meant so much to me. It wasn’t that I felt I needed to be thanked. It was just the time they took to let me know he had found his home. It really made my day!

I’m going to try to write more hand written notes of thanks or encouragement or….just because. It means a lot!