Cat's escapes inspire children's book

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"Not long ago, my people brought me here," Sox tells Pepper as they lounge at the kitty hotel. "When they picked me up, they took me to a house I'd never seen before."

"Different smells."

"Different feels."

"Different EVERYTHING. Yuck!"

And, like the real-life Sox, the fictionalized orange tabby in "Sox Looks For Home" tells his new friend of his efforts to find home after a move to a strange place by his people.

The real Sox's adventures began when Paul and Sue Graves decided to move from their longtime home to a new house across town. They are no strangers to the ways of cats — after the move, the couple kept Sox inside for several days, acquainting him with his new home.

After what they thought was an appropriate amount of time, they let Sox out in his new backyard.

When they went to let him in, Sox was gone.

Paul and Sue immediately started looking for him, calling his name and asking their new neighbors if they'd seen an orange tabby. No luck.

"This went on for two or three days," Paul Graves said. "Then we thought, well, I wonder if he went back to the old house. But we had not heard of cats doing that, although we've subsequently found out that they do."

So the couple called the owners of their old home and talked to the woman who was renting the home. A day or two later, she called: "I think I saw him."

Excited, the Graves rushed over.

Unfortunately, it wasn't Sox. While an orange tabby, this one has long hair — and belonged to the neighbor across the backyard fence.

A day later, the couple got another phone call: "I think I've seen him. In fact, he's back here in the alley."

This time, armed with food, the Graves returned to their old neighborhood, headed to the alley and called Sox's name.

"He poked his head around the fence and came over and got the food," Paul Graves said. "We picked him up and took him home. And he was fine for a good, long time."

A few weeks went by and Sox seemed to be settling in.

But then, one morning when they woke up, the front door was open … and Sox was gone.

Graves had accidentally left the door slightly ajar and it had been blown open by the heavy winds that pummeled the region that night. They alerted the woman renting their old home — and the neighbor across the alley — that Sox had gone on another walkabout and to keep an eye out for him.

Sox was sighted several times, but he would never come close enough for Paul or Sue Graves to pick him up. Worried, the couple made regular trips to their old neighborhood.

"It was probably the fifth or sixth day that he was gone, I was at the house across the fence," Paul Graves said. "I called his name and I heard him meow and he was in a shed right next to the house."

He grabbed some food and while Sox ate, Graves was able to pick him up and once again brought him home. The backyard was escape-proofed, they kept a close eye when Sox came and went through the cat door and, for a time, life settled back to normal.

And then, once again, Sox was gone.

Again, they let their old neighbors know that Sox had taken off again and to keep an eye out.

Days went by, then a week, and then another.

And, as time went on, the couple worried even more — after all their new home was across town from their own home and involved Sox traveling across a busy Highway 2 to get from one place to the other.

Eventually they got word that Sox had been seen and they even got close to him a time or two. Once, Sue Graves was able to grab him, but by then Sox was a little wild and clawed her, forcing her to drop him. Another time, Paul Graves was just a foot or two away but Sox would only come so close before scooting off.

Finally, he went to the store and bought a live trap and put it on the back deck of the neighbor's home and put some cat food inside. A few hours later, Paul Graves got a phone call: Sox was inside.

He rushed over to find a scared and battered Sox. Worried and upset, Graves managed to get Sox home and let him out — making sure all the doors were firmly closed.

Normally after being in a carrier, Sox would give his people a cold shoulder for a bit. Not this time.

"He just sidled up to us," Paul Graves said, adding with a laugh, "I could have strangled the little bugger."

This time, Sox was placed under house arrest. He wasn't allowed outside and the cat door was firmly locked. It would be six months before Sox was allowed outside — but only in the backyard, Graves said.

Each time Sox ran away, Graves would let the staff at North Idaho Animal Hospital know he was missing in the event he was brought in and his microchip read. After Sox's third runaway — and third home — one of the vet techs looked at Graves and suggested he write a book. At first, he dismissed the idea. While he writes regular columns about elder advocacy and faith, drawing upon his experience as an advocate and former Methodist minister, Graves said writing a book wasn't in his comfort zone.

The idea, however, wouldn't leave his head.

"Then I realized Sox should be telling the story," he said.

Soon, Sox was at the kitty hotel at the veterinary clinic after one of his adventures and telling his story to Pepper. "Oh, you want to stay home now, don't you," asks the black cat, modeled after one of the couple's former cats.

"Oh no," says Sox. "Not a chance."

At that point in the story, Graves said Sox is a "real snot-nose cat" but as the story unfolds — just like in real life — with each return home, the orange tabby become more amenable to the new home.

Once he completed the children's book, Graves turned to friends as well as to the Pend Oreille Arts Council, seeking advice on who might illustrate his tale. A friend who lived in Pullman suggested a young friend of his, Julie Coyle. When the couple met Coyle and her husband in Spokane, there was an immediate bond. While the artist didn't have any cats, she had owned them in the past and was familiar with the personality quirks.

Coyle visited the Graves' home, making sure to get pictures of Sox and both their new home and their old one. She even asked the couple to take a selfie. Then she went to work, adding movement and capturing Sox's personality and attitude.

The book goes to press on June 15 and will be available at Vanderford's and the Corner Book Store in Sandpoint later in the week. Book signings are tentatively planned for early July.

The story ends with Pepper turning to Sox and asking: "You don't want to run any more do you?"

"I don't know," Sox replies as three birds are pictured near a bird cage — two flying off and one on the perch. "All I want to do is find home. But where is home?"

Caroline Lobsinger can be reached by email at clobsinger@bonnercountydailybee.com and follow her on Twitter @CarolDailyBee.