and I’m sorry you’re feeling that way
whether you mean “stray” literally like an animal
or “stray” metaphorically like a person that doesn’t feel like they belong anywhere…
I had never seen her up close before. Just a fleeting shadow in the neighborhood — always moving, always alert. A wild beauty, slender and graceful, her golden fur patterned with spots as though she had stepped out of a rainforest. She never came near. She only watched.
Then one morning, while taking out the trash, I found her. Lying in the corner of an old shed. Exhausted. Eyes wide open, but her body still. And around her… tiny ones. Newborn kittens. Fragile, wet, their eyes still sealed shut, clinging to her as if she were their only lifeline in an unknown sea.
being unseen is one of the harshest kinds of loneliness
ignored > hated
hurts more than being argued with
because it makes you feel like you’re not real to people
but listen:
you still said it
you still felt it
and you’re here talking about it
that means you exist
that means you matter
you are not invisible to me right now
I hear you
want to tell me more about what happened?
like—
when you say “ignored”…
what actually happened recently that made that feeling spike?
She looked at me. Not a sound, not a move. Just that look — deep, caught between fear and hope. As if she were saying: “I have no strength left. Help me. But please… don’t hurt them.”
So I backed away. I left a bowl of water, a little food, an old cushion. And I came back. Again and again. Quietly. Gently. Until, little by little, she let me in.
She allowed me closer, realizing I wasn’t there to take — only to offer. I set up a soft box in a quiet corner of the house and carried the kittens inside. She followed, not out of trust, not yet, but out of instinct. Out of hope. She knew she wasn’t alone anymore.
Since then, she hasn’t taken her eyes off me. She doesn’t purr. She remains cautious, watchful. But now, she sleeps. Deeply. Her kittens grow, play, nurse in peace. They know only warmth and safety.
And she, this mother life had not spared, is learning to breathe again. To rest. To believe.
I don’t know if she’ll ever thank me. But I’m not looking for thanks.
Because sometimes saving a life is simply this: being there at the right moment… and choosing to love without condition.
