This is Pity Pat. About 4 years ago, she was seen running through my backyard into the nearby woods. At first I ignored her. I was not looking for a second cat. I admired her silky black fur from my deck, but she ran when she saw me. She looked to be about half-grown. I had assumed she belonged to someone.

However, as the days and weeks went by she was getting thinner and thinner. One morning I looked out and she was up on the deck eating bird seed out of the feeder.

(What a pity, I thought-the beginning of her name) By now she was skin and bones. I had to feed her. At first she wouldn't come near me. I would leave the food at the bottom of the stairs.

Then, I was sitting on the deck one morning and she jumped into my lap, settled down and purred! That was it! She moved in with us and our Russian Blue. They are good buddies. This picture shows her sitting in her favorite window, happy to be an indoor cat. She just loves people and greets everyone at the door with her little squeaky meow.

How lucky Pity Pat was that Shirley saved her from a certain death living outside. She's gone from eating bird seed to watching the birds outside safely from her window. Shirley titled this photo "Pity Pat Contemplating Life," and it does, indeed look that she's doing exactly that. This photo took my breath away and Shirley's story wrapped it up for me.

Pity Pat's photo also appears in the 2008 Black Cats Picture Gallery, as have all our Photos of the Week for this month.

My photos are selected from general photo submissions, but only from those who have followed the Photo Submittal Guidelines