If you have the space and the means I would heartily recommend getting your cat a cat. Pets do get lonely and if he was used to a colony then there’s a good chance this would improve his life. Bonus points if you can get your hands on one of the cats he was loving on at the shelter!

I think I was getting anxious about it because I’ve lost friends over not getting back to them in a timely way, but that was days or weeks versus hours.

Thank you for the reassurance.