Things in our house have been very stressful over the last week. Our neighbor (who is a young married professional with a new baby) has taken a very extreme and negative view of our cat, Barnes, visiting her property and going to the toilet in her soil. She is now setting traps to catch him and any other cat or animals that go onto her property to be shipped off to the city pound. By rights, she can do that as the city ordinances actually state that:
"Cats should be kept indoors and provided toys, companionship and a clean litter box. Stray cats may fight noisily and become a nuisance to neighbors."
John and I have tried to talk reasonably with her (there are many cats on our street that come and go through everyone's yard) but she is a very angry person and will not see the cat's side of things at all. In her eyes, we are the irresponsible pet owners that lets our cat outside and whatever happens to it is our fault. She has also said some other more mean and worrisome things, which I won't go into, but it's got us all very upset. Now, Barnes has to stay inside, which is painful for us all. All day, he comes up to me meowing pitifully and all I can say is I'm sorry Barnes :(
After our neighbor showed her true colors, John and I decided we can't live in an area where Barnes cannot go outside so we're planning to take Barnes on a trip to Canada and leave him with John's parents until we can move away from here. Our house doesn't feel like a home any more when Barnes is basically a prisoner here. Now our landlord is furious with the neighbor (he lives next to us so she's his neighbor too) and he hates to lose good tenants like us. What a sad mess it has become.
Has anyone else had an experience like this before?
