About 10 years ago, my family decided to get a cat. I had only ever owned a few fish as pets which are easy to handle, but we knew a cat would be a bit more of a commitment. We found someone whose cat had just given birth to kittens and they knew they couldn't keep all the newborn felines so my family decided to adopt a little grey one. I can't remember what they called him, but we named him Jake. As soon as the kittens were allowed to leave their mother, we took him home.
At this point, we still had some fish and little Jake was obsessed with them. He was still a tiny little furball so he couldn't reach the fish tank quite yet, but he would watch from the floor as they swam around. I remember one time when he was very small, I was swinging one of his toys around and he was chasing it (apparently when they are younger they have a lot more energy) and at one point I guess I had it too close to my face because he ran, jumped and used my face as a sort of "back board" to bounce off of and get his toy. That hurt a bit.
A year or two passed and my family was getting a little busier with work and school, so we decided Jake needed a friend to play with while we were out of the house. So we adopted another cat from a distant relative. Her name was Jaguar and the relative had found her and her brother wandering down the road with no tags or microchips. She was extremely fearful of people, which leads us to believe that the owners prior to our relative may have abused her. However, we felt she was a good match for our family so we adopted her and renamed her Jasmine (when she was Jaguar, her nickname was Jags and now that she's Jasmine, we call her Jaz sometimes - it rhymes).
A few years later, my dad got a new job about an hour away so we had to move closer. The cats were terrified of the new house and stayed close to each other for about two weeks before they finally started to get used to the home. There we lived for seven years. Then my parents wanted to buy a house rather than rent one, so we found one about 15 minutes away. This one had a fenced in backyard and my sisters had been begging for a dog for so long.
2016 had begun. My mom and sisters went to the Humane Society at least once a week for the previous four months and a few days before I went back to college for my January term, we went to the shelter and saw a Husky who had just arrived. My sisters fell in love with her and I guess so did I. My mom was torn between whether or not she would be the right dog for us. So we decided to come back with my dad the day I had to move back into college and we decided she was the right choice and so we adopted her and named her Brooke (her original name was Cinnamon Roll).
I wasn't there to see her first week at home, but my family told me that once again, the cats were terrified. It took everyone some time to adjust to walking her, feeding her, and overall just having another (larger) animal in the house.
When we had just Jake and Jasmine, I thought I was a cat person. Even though we had fish before, it just felt like cats were the right pets for me. However, now that we have Brooke, I don't think I can call myself a cat person because I love her so much. So I guess now I'm a pet person and I probably will be my whole life. Next pet goal though: a chinchilla.
