Aloha! I'm Sweetie.
In Feb 2016 I was rescued by the East Maui Animal Refuge. I was dropped off at the vet by somebody who found me in critical condition. My right eye had to be removed. The vet said it may have been a chicken fight but there was no way to know what happened. There was no one to take care of me. I'm a special needs cat because I have only one eye. Many facilities euthanize special needs animals because they require more care, cost more money and aren't perfectly cute, so they are not likely to be adopted.
Lucky for me, the vet knew about the East Maui Animal Refuge. They rescue animals who have no other options. My mom is a volunteer at the refuge and as soon as she saw me kicking and screaming in the kennel she whisked me away - just to foster me until my operation healed. But we fell in love and she immediately adopted me.
At first my mom thought I might be aggressive or violent, based on my behavior in the kennel at the refuge. And I screamed and cried and tried to fight my way out of the cat carrier for the entire ride home to her house. But as soon as we got home and she opened the kennel, I immediately crawled into her lap and began to relax. I was so anxious and now I felt safe. She had a soothing voice and she gave me plenty of time and space to explore and get comfortable with my new home, new space and new people.
The name on my chart was Sweetie. My mom didn't like that name and she started to think of interesting Hawaiian names, like Ku'uipo, which means sweetheart, or Pono, which means beneficial. But she kept calling me Sweetie because I am so sweet and cuddly. So it stuck. She calls me Sweetie or Honey or My Kitten.
We live on Maui. My mom is a consultant and she commuted to New York, California (and London!) for work, so she was away a lot. But dad and I would have fun playing music and staying up late. Then mom got a job in the Bay Area where she had to be onsite. Even though I love my dad, he thought I should go be with mom in California while she had to be onsite for work. So I moved. I flew across the Pacific ocean! I enjoyed my new home with mom, especially since there was more cat furniture than people furniture. And my grandpa built a catio (an enclosed cat patio) for me to sit outside and watch the squirrels and the blue jays.
Then, after a year, my mom got a job back home in Hawaii, but she needed to be onsite for work on Oahu, so we moved to Kailua where I had a gigantic house with even more cat trees and tons of windows and fresh air and breezy tropical trade winds. Dad stayed on Maui and came to visit us every weekend. Then the Covid pandemic hit and mom had to work from home. So we moved back home to Maui.
I spend every morning snuggling with my mom while she has tea. She gets up early and the morning is our snuggle time. You will see many snuggle photos on my site. We spend at least an hour together before she starts work. First we snuggle in bed where she has her first cup of tea. Then she gives me breakfast. She makes a big deal of that and we both get really excited for breakfast. Then she moves to the living room where we relax with another cup of tea. Finally, she goes to her desk for the rest of the day. I stay by her side and walk across the keyboard at just the wrong moment. We laugh.
I have many floor-to-ceiling cat trees positioned next to all the big windows. I love to climb up to the top and survey my kingdom. Sometimes I race up the cat tree, wildly flinging myself from one level to another, and nearly falling, and scaring the crap out of my mom. I like to take naps in my cat hammock at the top of the various cat trees.
I have a gazillion toys, two of which I actually like at any given moment. I play with my favorites all the time. One is a mouse with a bell inside and the other is a catnip fish. I also like to play with the feather toy that my mom waves around. We race around the house, up and down the cat trees, and under the furniture with that feather toy.
I hope you enjoy my site. My mom made it because she doesn't have any more space on her phone for my photos and she likes to look at them all the time. She really loves me.