Tinkle, Thomas and Toffee: The Terrific Trio!

By Niggy

Tinkle, Thomas and Toffee—three lovely kittens—landed, along with their mother Tracy, in my friend Nancy’s backyard one fine day. While Tracy often visited Nancy’s house, munched something there and then went her way, she had secretly kept her kittens elsewhere, and only when they grew bigger did she bring them along!

Tinkle, Thomas and Toffee looked like tiger cubs, and they were full of energy always. They behaved very goody-goody during the day, snacking on kitty kibbles and sleeping on the shed much of the day, very demurely. But at night, their kitty party would begin. Most of the time, Tinkle and Thomas paired up together to play games like dropping-the-stick, pushing-the-shoe, bucket-tumble, and what not! For his part, Toffee loved being by himself or else hanging around with his mother Tracy: He was a sort of ‘mumma’s boy’. Toffee was used by Tinkle and Thomas to do errands quite often: They would make him jump up near the window to mew and call out to Nancy to serve food, and then, when the food would arrive, they would have a hearty meal.

Tracy was a good mother. She would wait until all her three children had eaten and only then would have her share of food. At night, the kittens would all happily cuddle up with her on the water drum outside. It must have been warm and cozy being with their mumma like that.

I suppose its nature’s way with mother cats—after a few weeks, Tracy stopped paying attention to the kittens and went about roaming elsewhere. While Tinkle and Thomas, the adorable duo, often set off on their own adventurous exploration trips, being missing for hours, Toffee would paw inside Nancy’s house and scamper about happily.

Tinkle, Thomas and Toffee would curl up all together at night and sleep, hugging each other. It was their way of probably saying, “So what if our Mumma is not caring for us? We three are there for each other.”

It so happened that one day, Tinkle fell ill and returned to God. Thomas and Toffee felt lost and began moving around together. But just a few days later, Thomas too fell ill and passed away. I just can’t imagine how Toffee must have felt being all alone: a little kitten, with his mother not caring for him and his two siblings having gone back to God. But Toffee seemed to have surrendered to God’s will that he had to be by himself now. Although Nancy’s house was open for him, he preferred to wander by himself, here and there.

Tinkle, Thomas and Toffee have a lot to teach us. The first two lived a short but sweet life, enjoying every moment being in the present, playing and jumping about, hunting, exploring and just being plain naughty, being full of life and also contented with what they got to eat and where they got to sleep. They had no fear of the future even after their mother stopped caring for them. When they fell ill, they must have been in some pain, but they passed away peacefully without whining and pining.

The last that I had heard about Toffee was that he was not to be seen. He must have wandered off exploring the unknown world ahead of him. While I hope and pray that he is safe wherever he is, we can learn from his acceptance of his situation, his 100 per cent surrender to God!

We humans lose often our courage and hope if our near and dear ones go away, die or simply abandon us. We fail to understand that it is God who is our Eternal Guardian. But just look how the terrific kitty trio—Tinkle, Thomas and Toffee—allowed God to handle their lives! God called back two of them, and the third’s—brave Toffee’s—path will be also decided by God!