Portrait of a very old lady

Portrait of a very old lady. Phoebe - half awake or maybe half asleep-on her absolute favourite place a green mat on the couch last week. Nowadays she spends 99% of her time in this location in a nest of cushions. She only gets up for food and water and calls of nature. She is awake in the evenings when she demands attention when she purrs loudly. Very rarely does she wander upstairs to other rooms. She does go outside onto the deck some evenings but now, in the winter, not for long. Too cold for an old lady.

She is now 20-a ripe old age for a pure bred cat-and she is the oldest cat on the books at the Terrigal Vet hospital. Her age is, not surprisingly, showing. Climbing the stairs is not so easy although sometimes she runs down them too quickly for safety. She has very thick coat and she does not groom it as thoroughly as she used to and knots and mats form. Getting them out is not easy for me or her. Nonetheless she is in surprisingly good shape. She eats really well and is not too fussy although she does have some favourite foods which I suspect she would be content to eat for every meal. I dread the day she is no longer with us. It will be a very sad loss.

To say she is part of the family is an understatement . Yesterday the granddaughters were visiting and she is quite content to let them make a fuss of her. All vigorous stroking and petting accepted without complaint although we did brush her and removed some knots and she soon ran out of patience.

The photo was taken with my Leica X Vario-an ideal cat camera as the tiltable electronic viewfinder( EVF) allows me to get the camera down low and then look down into the viewfinder. The zoom lens is superb. It must be one of the best, if not the best, zoom lens ever made. A big call but use it and I'm sure you'd be convinced.