The story of how Will and I met reads something like the plot of a cheesy, Hallmark Channel romance movie. And it's all thanks to one very special little cat.
I was eight months into my job as an arts and culture writer for this very newspaper. Taking full advantage of the creative freedom to pursue passion projects, I'd taken up the baton from my predecessor to write the Inlander's (now since-retired) Cat Friday blog. For a new series called "Inland Northwest Business Cats," I began profiling felines-in-residence at local shops and offices. My next featured subjects — whom I'd spotted on social media thanks to a mutual friend's photo re-share — happened to be a handsome young man whose 14-year-old cat, Maddie, was a part-time office cat at a local web design firm.
On Thursday, March 21, 2013, I walked a couple blocks from the Inlander's old Hutton Building offices to the Liberty Building to meet Will and Maddie for the first time. To be perfectly clear, I was definitely just as interested in meeting the bespectacled Will as I was his adorable old gal. And when I did, using my interview skills to both get the story and satisfy my ulterior motives, I knew instantly that he was someone — and Maddie some cat — very special.
During our chat, Will shared that Maddie first became his part-time officemate because he was having the floors of his home refinished and didn't want to confine her alone in the basement with all that noise. Having a private office with a door meant Maddie could safely hang out while he worked, and it was an enrichment she frequently enjoyed henceforth. But the real kicker for me — besides Will's good looks and left-brained smarts — was the story of how Maddie became his cat.
After a friend alerted Will of Maddie's need for a new home, he drove to Seattle and back to retrieve the senior cat. If that's not the definition of a total softie with a selfless heart of gold, I thought, we're all doomed. I was completely smitten, writing, "This endearing tale will melt your heart into a puddle of mush and give you faith in humanity. Fellow cat-loving ladies will swoon."
Yet no one, dear reader, swooned as deeply as me.
A few days later, some Inlander staffers and I walked to lunch together. "I think I met my soulmate!" I gushed to two coworkers and fellow cat ladies.
And so, here we are — more than 10 years later and still happily together, with dear Maddie's legacy, Dellie, at the center of our cat-loving love story.
I still joke, though it's actually a verifiable fact, that Maddie took on the role of matchmaker, calling upon some undetectable feline magic to bring Will and me together. But before Maddie drew me into her schemes, I had to become a cat lady in the first place, and that credit goes to my immediate family's dear Alice, who spent 19 happy years with us before departing this plane of existence last fall. And if not for Maddie bringing us together, we wouldn't have found our sweet, talkative fluffball Dellie. We adopted her together in May 2016 from the Spokane Humane Society, a few months after I'd officially moved in with Will.
As I write this, I text Will and ask him what he remembers about our first, fateful meeting all those years ago. Besides the immediate physical attraction he says he had for me ("Oh no, she's hot!" he texts, and I reply with the laugh-cry emoji), he remembers deciding that day to ask me out on a date. For the record, though, I beat him to it, messaging him on Facebook to suggest we meet up. Our first date was early morning, pre-work coffee at Boots Bakery, suggested by Will. I agonized and analyzed whether the time and place was a friend-zone move, but now I know it was just Will's deeply ingrained sense of practicality. Our second date was a show at Spokane Civic Theatre, and the third was a day hike at Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge. On the way there, we stopped to save a red-bellied turtle in the middle of the highway from being run over. Will got sunscreen in his eyes, and we ended the date with pizza at the Flying Goat.
Maddie was there, too, for most of those first two and a half years. While she was always Will's cat first, I doted on and loved her as my own. Wherever Maddie's spirit soars now, I like to think she's purring with happiness, still proud of her matchmaking success, and of the foundation of love she led us to build upon.
As for Dellie, she has Maddie to thank, too. She's living a life of pure luxury and adoration as an only-cat in a double-income, no-kids household! ♦
