Gwen Cooper - Homer and the Holiday Miracle: A True Story

Contents

i Praise for Homers Odyssey

A must-read for anyone who has ever loved an animal.

Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star

Heartwarming and entertaining.

PEOPLE Pets

Delightful... This lovely human-feline memoir... is sure to warm the hearts of all pet lovers.

Library Journal

A wonderful story celebrating the profound bond that can form between feline and human. Homers Odyssey is an inspiring read, and a perfect holiday gift for any cat lovers on your list.

Feline Wellness

I am certain it would be impossible to meet Homer without falling in love with him and it is just as difficult to read this loving account without coming away with a renewed faith in the unique bond that can sometimes arise between two alien species. Gwen Cooper writes with humor, with wit, with candor, and most of all with irresistible warmth for this astonishing little feline who will steal your heart.

J EFFREY M OUSSAIEFF M ASSON , New York Times bestselling author of The Nine Emotional Lives of Cats and When Elephants Weep

ii Praise for Love Saves the Day

Once again Gwen Cooper shines her light on the territory that defines the human/animal bond. In Love Saves the Day, she creates an emotional landscape so beautifully complete that we cant help but share in the heartbreaks and triumphs of her characters, regardless of their species. That, in itself, is a reason to stand up and cheer.

J ACKSON G ALAXY , star of My Cat From Hell and author of Cat Daddy

[A] poignant tale... [Gwen Cooper] once again demonstrates her compassionate fluency in felinespeak and proves equally adept at conveying compels human emotions with flair and sensitivity.

Booklist

Unforgettably moving... a hard one to put down.

Modern Cat

If you are the Most Important Person to a cat, you will hold them much tighter by the books end. If you dont have a cat, Prudence will have surreptitiously lured you into the danger zone: Falling in love with a cat because they need family too.

The Vancouver Sun

iii

xvii xviii

v

vi Copyright 2018 by Gwen Cooper

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

BenBella Books, Inc.

10440 N. Central Expressway, Suite 800 | Dallas, TX 75231

www.benbellabooks.com

Send feedback to

First E-Book Edition: October 2018

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.

978-1-946885-7-84 (print)

978-1-946885-8-21 (e-book)

Editing by Leah Wilson

Copyediting by Karen Wise

Proofreading by Cape Cod Compositors, Inc.

Text design and composition by Silver Feather Design

Cover design by Sarah Avinger

Printed by Lake Book Manufacturing

Distributed to the trade by Two Rivers Distribution, an Ingram brand

www.tworiversdistribution.com

vii For the Homers Heroes in animal rescue, who work tirelessly to make sure every cat and dog has the home they deserveat the holidays, and all year round viii

ix A candle is a small thing. But one candle can light another. And see how its own light increases, as a candle gives its flame to the other.

M OSHE D AVIS x

CONTENTS

W hen most people think about cats at the holidays, their thoughts are more apt to turn to mischief than miracles. If youre a cat person yourself (and Im guessing you are), then you dont need to see any one of dozens of viral videos to know what cats will do to a Christmas treethe gleeful way they smash ornaments, tangle up lights, shred carefully handcrafted paper trimmings, or simply knock the whole tree down altogether. And heaven help your poor angelic tree topperperhaps handed down in your family for generationsif it falls into the pitiless clutches of your feline friend.

Homerthe blind, black cat I adopted as a very young kitten in 1997destroyed exactly one Christmas tree in just such a fashion. It was the first I had allowed myself to indulge in after moving out of my parents house. After its destruction, with many a regretful sigh, I gave up on the idea of having a holiday tree of my very own. I learned to make do with a single strand of multihued lights festooned around the living room ceilingalthough achieving even that much holiday cheer was something of a chore with Homer around. Hed follow behind me, yanking the string of lights down as fast as I could fasten it up, twining the lights (and his body along with them) into increasingly complex knots until finally, my patience exhausted, Id yell, Homer! Enough already!

Then there was the year when I made the fatal error of leaving unattended for one minute (one minute, I tell you!) the pile of holiday gifts Id spent two hours painstakingly wrapping. I returned to find what looked like a crime scene, or the wreckage left behind by a school of paper-loving piranhas that had somehow made it from water to land. Every year after thatin a gesture I made with profound love, but also with the certain knowledge that I was allowing Homer to shake me down in what was basically an oldschool protection racketId bury a catnip toy in some tissue paper, place it carefully in the kind of flip-top box Homer could easily open, and wrap the whole thing in colorful gift paper topped with ribbons.

I liked to joke about Homers superpowersthe off-the-charts hearing that allowed him to catch buzzing flies (flies he couldnt even see!) in midair; the keen sense of smell capable of detecting his favorite deli turkey even through four or five layers of wax paper and plastic bags. So it was no surprise that Homers sensitive nose could detect the scent of catnip lurking in the depths of his holiday gift box, and I think he enjoyed tearing the box, paper, and ribbon to pieces almost as much as he loved the catnip-laced prize itself. In any event, this seasonal bribe usually ensured the safety of all my other wrapped giftsalthough I still had to guard my spool of ribbon, using my whole body to shield it, as carefully as the Secret Service guards the president.

Theres plenty of feline mischief in the tale Im about to tell, because Homer was, above all things, a mischievous, fun-loving cat. Ultimately, though, this is the story of a bona fide holiday miracle that happened in our own home, before our own eyes.

Before we go back, however, to five years ago when all this happened, I first have to take you back a bit fartherto just over two thousand years ago. Most people know the story of Christmas and the idea of Christmastime as a joyous season when miracles abound. But not as many know the story of Hanukkah, which typically falls near Christmas on the calendar. Both stories are important to this one.