A-maiz-ing

My little nugget of a honey girl is named Maizy.

I've blogged about Maizy before- but I have to say, lately... she has really stolen my heart.

She is the complete opposite of my Toby who died last year. In fact, after Toby died- I really couldn't stand the thought of getting another cat, of having a pet who could even remotely replace him.

A few days after I got Maizy- nine months after Toby died- I felt like I had made a huge mistake. She was so tiny (four weeks old!), needed so much care- and I honestly felt numb, like I had this huge responsibility on my shoulders, this precious thing to take care of- and I couldn't. I wasn't capable of it. I didn't have enough love left in my heart. Every time I looked at her, the ache of losing Toby came back all over again.

What a transformation seven months makes! And in truth, just weeks after bringing her home I knew it was right.  I think God intended for me to have her, to have a complete opposite experience than I did before. He knew I could never replace Toby; so he just made room in my heart- and my head- for something completely different than Toby.  150% different, in fact.

Toby was soft and quiet and cuddly and furry like a lion. He shed all over the place. He always preferred home over adventure and needed coaxing out from underneath the bed/behind the water heater/on top of the cabinets regularly.  He was the one thing that made my first steps into adulthood bearable, when I lived in a new city and worked a tough night shift and knew very few people.

He was my entire world for four years- the first chapter of my adulthood.

Maizy is loud and in-your-face. She has lots of attitude and prefers adventure over- well, anything. She's a great traveler; she is feisty and rarely cuddly- but when she wants to cuddle, she's all yours. She has never met a stranger and hasn't spent a minute of her life hiding from anything.

She is becoming my entire world- and, I truly believe, a symbol of the next chapter of my adulthood.

There might be some reading this thinking, we're talking about a cat, right?

But for anyone who has ever loved- and lost- a pet, you know the hole that leaves in your heart and how hard that is to fill.

Maizy was born in April of 2011, and came to live with me in May- and I'm pretty sure an angel named Toby had something to do with it!