Night Cats

He was walking a couple feet in front of me, shaggy hair down to his shoulders, looked like he was mixed, and he stomped his feet in front of a young cat, causing it to run under a nearby metallic black fence. "You don't like cats?" I queried, about two meters behind him.
"I love cats--I just wanted him to be safe--it's not safe on these streets," he responded, with a warm, somewhat deeper voice that immediately conveyed to me his goodwill for the cat, and for his neighbor. We chatted for a bit about cats, and he mentioned to me that there was a whole family of cats who lived in the park a block away, so we casually strolled over there, sharing bits and pieces of our separate lives. I was overjoyed to see a cat hanging out by the fence of the park (it's locked at night) and we continued our conversation, which now moved onto more spiritual matters. He has been a follower of Jesus for several years, after traveling to Europe, and living homelessly there and in the US, where he met Jesus through some loving people at the Los Angeles Mission. He plans to leave in a couple of days in order to do a sixth month stint at a program outside the city (he confessed he has been taking consolation in drinking, more recently. After a little while, an older lady came next to the park, pushing her large grocery cart brimming with her stuff, and dropped a large pile of cat food past the wrought iron gate for the cats to feed on--and they came--probably five or six of them at various sizes. Ben called her "mama" and introduced me to her. She was hunched over and when I talked with her after Ben left, she seemed to be somewhat senile. The parts of what she said that I could make out broke my heart--how she had been "sodomized" when she was homeless, but now stayed inside. I bade my farewell, after she said she had to leave because she had a busy night, and might not get much sleep (I have no idea what she was going to be doing). I hope to see the cats, and Ben, and Mama, again.