[ride the whirlwind]

...On my ninth birthday, my parents gave her to me with a red bow around her neck...

I love your story. So good ol' mom came through after all! Here's our calico, Sadie, a few months ago:

[GretchenEE]

Her best trick I taught her in defense of my self and my clothing. She initiated jumping (with me unaware) from the floor so that I would hold her but often she'd catch her claws into me or my clothes, so I taught her to wait until I bent my left knee forward, then I'd pat my knee and she'd leap onto it, then up into my arms, after which she always rubbed the side of her face against the corner of my glasses and purred very contentedly.

[GretchenEE]

Sadie's a beauty.