Gone to the artichokes

There have been times over the past two years when Three Paw would disappear into my neighbour's garden and lounge under the artichokes. I could never understand why she did it when she had a beautiful, sprawling garden of her own but she was a street cat I suppose - a wanderer by nature. 

Now this garden she went to wasn't even the one next door and so the journey to get there was quite some feat on three paws. First, she had to navigate the increasingly complex impenetrada gate I would have fashioned out of wood and an old sun-lounger. I never saw how she got through it but she always found a way. Then she had to forge her way through a wild garden of brambles and bushes on a slope which even I struggled with. I never saw her do this either. ( An Italian friend actually asked me recently if Three Paw could teleport and now when I I think about it maybe she could.) Once she made it through the jungle slope, she had to climb through a marshy vegetable garden and then up a flight of steep stairs.

And yet somehow she did it.
And not just once. She even did it one time with the tumour on her leg.

Every time she disappeared I would be thrown into a panic. Pirate would come running to the door saying ' Sheeeee's goooone' and we would begin our frantic search for her. Pirate scouring with her one eyes from up in a fig tree. Mostly  I found her under the artichokes or another bush but sometimes she was right up the top of the garden pottering among the tools.

I remember the time she disappeared for a whole night. Me traipsing through my neighbour's garden in my pyjama pants and a flashlight. She was nowhere to be found. At just after dawn, I returned home defeated and desolate. I lay on the sofa and reasoned if I just rested for half an hour I would find my energy again. Then about twenty minutes later I heard the jingle of her bell up my stairs and she arrived with a bound, inquiring about breakfast.

A friend and I have decided she has gone to the artichokes now.