I'm Ava Woolf, and I've been feeding the stray cats in my neighborhood for the past three years. Some of the cats who show up are very wild, wily beauties who stop by for a feed and some praise, then move on, not seen again for weeks or months at a time. Some are so feral that they only come out at night and I only catch sight of them if I'm sleeping downstairs by the fire. But others show up with that look in their eyes that says, "please take me in." Bibs is one of those.

He showed up out of nowhere this spring, ambling up our front walk as I sat drinking morning coffee. He pressed his big bear head into my hands and I fell utterly in love. I brought him food and we sat together in the morning sun as he ate. He rolled over in delight when I pet him. I called him Bibs and told him he was good.

The next day he was back, and the next and the next. We fed him and pet him and praised him each time, and commented to each other that his appearance was so sudden, and his hunger so great, that it felt like he must have been an owned cat who was suddenly abandoned. When we opened our door he would press his way in, and sometimes we let him, because we had fallen so in love, and other times we had to lovingly block him, or carry him back out into the garden to sit in the sun and nibble catmint.

We already had four cats, two of which were neighborhood strays that we had rescued just like this. The male I had rescued from a snowstorm the previous year had been unneutered, and very weak, and for four months he marked our house and we followed behind him with enzyme spray, trying to control the worst of the smell until he was strong enough to get safely neutered. This time I just couldn't do it again. I was exhausted. And this cat was healthy, but we couldn't afford the vet bills right now, so we agreed we'd make it a goal to look out for the next low cost spay neuter program run by the local SPCA. We'd get him in by fall, and make him a family member before winter.

But in the strange way of things, by late summer we hadn't seen him for a while, and we were fostering a passel of rescue kittens. On top of that the boy I'd rescued from the snowstorm was in very ill health and requiring a lot of care. One day when Bibs finally reappeared he looked nothing like his old solid happy self. He was ragged and thin, and his personality was changed. I wept, because I could tell that he'd had encounters with the other strays that had changed him, made him more cautious, a little jumpy. I fed him and gave him a flea/dewormer treatment, and within a few days he was looking healthier and putting weight back on. But I couldn't bring him inside with the kittens and my sick boy. And the SPCA and local cat rescue were both out of funds.

I cried because I didn't have enough money to just scoop him up on that very first day he arrived on our doorstep, to take him to the vet, get him fixed, and make him a part of our family. I cried because my lack of money meant that he had been homeless, and had been hurt. And I cried because someone who was supposed to be his forever home had abandoned him in the first place. None of it was right, and it all made me hurt, and I was already feeding more stray cats than we could afford, a full time feral, and three other strays that were regulars in the neighborhood.

This week I learned that two families in the apartment down the street from us have also been feeding Bibs, and they have made him an outdoor house with a heating mat. They want to give him a home, but also need him to be neutered before they can bring him inside. Like myself, they can't afford the full cost of the vet bill. So I am asking for help. This sweet boy deserves to be safe and warm and sleeping on a bed, not wandering the streets wondering why his first family abruptly left him behind. He is still so affectionate even with all that has happened to him.

Please help us get him to the vet. Every day that he is out there on his own hurts my heart. I just want to get him safe and warm and loved.