Meet Sheba, the oldest cat in Dewey

Sheba looked spry for her advanced years. Uncurling from a nap, the gray tabby looked at her owner, eyes squinted, and seemed to ask: what could possibly be so important?

“In December, she’ll be 25,” said Joseph Salee. “She’s really a pretty smart kitty.”

She was slow to rise, but otherwise betrayed few signs of her age, climbing easily into Salee’s arms. She’s a bit hard of hearing, he said, and a weak hind leg prevents her from jumping.

“She’s kind of embarrassed,” he said. She’s used to vaulting herself onto the Salee’s porch railing, her favorite perch for watching the nightlife pass at Que Pasa next door. She likes the deck, he said, and misses it during the winter months in Washington, D.C.; but these days, she needs a hand.

Salee inherited Sheba when the cat was a little older than 2 years. Her original owner, Salee’s ex-girlfriend, took off for Los Angeles, leaving him with the cat.

“It’s like a close relationship,” he said. “I’ve had a couple of girlfriends come and go, but she’s always there.”

After more than 22 years together, Salee said they’ve learned to communicate. Sheba doesn’t hesitate to meow loudly in the morning, dragging her owner out of bed to start the day.

“I think sometimes she says to me, get out of bed, refresh my food,” he said.

Shebe might be the oldest cat on the East Coast, Salee mused – by now, she could have finished graduate school. Salee, a Kurdish native of Cypress, attended graduate school in Indiana and spent his career working for Morgan Stanley. Now semi-retired – he’s writing a book on Kurdish nationalism – he spends his summers at The Cove, a condominium unit adjacent to Ruddertowne.

He’s been a seasonal resident since the mid-80s; Sheba started joining him in 1994. She’s a homebody, he said, and she enjoys the vista from his porch – when she isn’t napping in the bedroom, a lump under the covers.

For the last seven years, he said, he’s worried that each Dewey summer would be her last. Four years ago, a veterinarian said her kidneys were failing, and gave her a year to live. Salee said he started her on a diet of turkey, fish and shaved carrots, not bothering to look at the results of Sheba’s blood test.

Maybe the vet was wrong; maybe Sheba was just lucky. Whatever the case, she gets another Dewey summer.

“She’s in good shape right now,” he said. “She still plays.”