A Close Call, Parts I and II

I posted this photo and journaling (written by Lily) awhile back. Over the weekend, I finally put together the layout.

While I was working on it yesterday, Lily was busy in the same room, climbing the mutton bars on the window. She made it all the way to the top before I realized it. Just as I spotted her, the mutton bars gave way and toppled over backward, Lily still attached, just like tree falling. Narrowly missing my scrapbook table, Lily and the mutton bars hit the floor, mutton bars breaking and Lily running at break-neck speed from the room. Thus ends Part I of the story.

Now begins Part II. I turned to the task of replacing the mutton bars and patching them together in sly fashion (so as to not attract the attention of DH -- who does not often read this blog, BTW). From down the hall, I heard the sound of Lily playing with the spindles on our stairway, which she often does. Then all of a sudden, there was a WHOOSH!! followed by a THUD!! Strange sound, I thought.

Sure that she had knocked over a table in our bedroom (again), I ran to inspect. All tables were intact. Continuing on, I glanced over the railing of our balcony to the tile floor below.

There was Lily, half-sitting, half-lying down on the rug by the front door, shaking her head with a dazed look. Our "elevator" basket, which hangs from the balcony railing by a purple ribbon, was swinging wilding from side to side. In a sickening instant, it became quite clear to me that Lily had either jumped or fallen from the 2nd to the 1st floor. It remains to be seen whether she was attempting to jump into the elevator basket or just slipped while trying to reach it. Either way, I felt sick with fear.

I ran down to where Lily sat. She stood up, walked a few steps, then stopped. She walked a few more steps then stopped again, each time with a strange look on her face. Then she jumped onto a dining room chair and crouched awkwardly. I tried to assess if she was injured and after close inspection, she appeared to be shaken but unharmed. I carefully lifted her and put her on a bench where she lay and rested for a bit and soon began to purr. She played with a feather I wiggled in front of her. I was filled with an enormous sense of relief.

For the rest of the day, she was quite subdued (as was I). Today she is back to her previous energy level (in fact, I had to take a break from writing this to extract her from the dollhouse; she had entered via the front door and exited out the kitchen, walking carefully around the tiny kitchen table).

We have been very careful to watch Lily around the railing and train her not to hang out over the edge. In fact, we've had it covered with poster board up until about a month ago, fearful of this very thing happening. When she started jumping up to see over the poster board, we had to remove it. So, while I feel terrible that this incident happened, I can't say that I'm exactly surprised.

We all hope she learned her lesson and won't venture so close to the balcony again. I know that cats (for the most part) always land on their feet, but I sure don't. I think I might have lost one of my nine lives.

Meanwhile, her Grandma would like to sew her a kitten-sized cape, made just for flying. I think pink would be nice, don't you?