This event was foreshadowed by Ranger,
my friend B's cat. B was going out of town and needed someone to look
after her cat, Ranger. Rather than leave him home alone, she thought
Ranger might enjoy the company of our family. I reminded her that
"our family" included Baby and Gummi, but B thought Ranger
could deal with that.
Ranger was a handsome cat, a furry
tortoiseshell colored cat with a mellow disposition. After a few
minutes to gather his bearings, he just became one of the gang.
Within half a day of residence, we already had 15 nicknames for him.
Endearing ones, not the other type.
Now we had a cat a while ago. Boots the
Chemist was her name. I'd try to explain the story behind her name,
but you'll just have to trust me that's it's a lot funnier in my mind
than in yours. Bo and I got her when we were first married. She was
like our trial child. We figured, if the cat lived past a year, we
were responsible enough to have babies. So Boots was a part of our
lives for 20 years. And people loved that cat. I don't know what it
was about her. She had a mojo going on like no other pet I know. One
friend who used to stop by regularly would make it a point to greet
the cat. Others would just gush how pretty she was.
But Boots eventually took ill a year
ago and passed on to her great reward, that great sunny spot on the
rug in the sky. Bo and I figured, with 6 kids, we're done with the
pet thing; the cat hair getting into stuff, allergic guests,
"accidents." I swear cat urine is one of the great
under-utilized weapons of mass destruction. Bo was really adamant
about no pets since he was on litter box cleaning duty for 20 years.
We didn't want any pets. At least nothing that wasn't going to give
us a gallon of milk per day.
So after Ranger went home with his mom,
the kids were asking us for a cat. While we enjoyed having our 'guest
pet', Bo and I looked at each other and confirmed we didn't want to
deal with a pet for a while.
The very next day, the mail man rang
our doorbell to give us a package. Over the years, we've gotten to
know Mailman Mike. Yes, I know they're called Letter Carriers, but
then there would be no alliteration, now would there? While I was
talking to him, he said, "Hey, your cat got out." For a
brief moment I thought, "Did Ranger make his way back here?"
I mean, you hear those crazy stories of animals traveling thousands
of miles to be with someone and maybe Ranger and Gummi really bonded.
All this went through my mind in a flash before I said to Mailman
Mike, "We don't have a cat." To which he replied, "Well,
whose cat is that?" pointing to the kitten on our front porch. I
looked at the kitten, I looked at Mike, Mike looked at me. It was
soon obvious that Mailman Mike was impervious to my telekinetic
powers willing him to take the kitten with him. After a brief
discussion about where said kitten could have come from, Mailman Mike
smiled and said, "Well, good luck!" and walked off.
Aarrrgh! What was I going to do now?!?
I didn't have any cat food, no litter, what if the kitten had fleas?
I went to my neighbor's house. He's a vet. He's got four cats
already. He's probably got cat food and litter and heck, he might,
out of the kindness of his heart, offer to take the kitten off my
hands, right? He gave me food, he gave me litter and told me, "Let
me know how you make out." Don't people recognize someone who is
in desperate need of shirking responsibility? Could they not see the
panicked look on my face?
I went home and with my son, W. Bear,
posted signs around the neighborhood. I also told all the swooning
children to not get too attached to the kitten because we were not
keeping it. Obedient children that they are, they started to call the
kitten Boromir.
That evening, we got a call from
someone in the neighborhood who didn't own the kitten, but would be
willing to take her if no one else claimed her. "Yay!" I
thought, "a happy home!" I did the responsible thing by
calling his landlord to make sure this guy was on the up and up. I
thought this was divine intervention as the landlord turned out to be
an acquaintance of ours. This kitten would go to someone responsible
who wanted her. Alas, a day later, he called to say he changed his
mind.
Disappointed, I informed the children
that we would have to take the kitten to the animal shelter.
Thankfully, the Providence Animal Rescue League (PARL) is a no kill
shelter, but I still felt bad that this itty bitty thing was going to
the shelter.
The next day, W. Bear, Baby and I took
the kitten to the shelter to drop her off. The shelter volunteer told
me they ordinarily do not take strays unless I called the city animal
control officer first. I looked at the woman, "I'm supposed to
call a city agency and hope to have this situation addressed before
next year?" She said, "You're right, let me talk to my
supervisor." So off she went, and Baby who was not supposed to
become attached to this kitten, asked, "Can we buy these toys
for her?"
The lovely PARL volunteer came back and
told me the supervisor said they would take the kitten. Yay! Then she
told me the kitten was on the small side and might have health issues
living in close proximity to older cats. Much like when you take a
newborn to the doctor's office, they segregate the newborn so she
doesn't catch germs from the other patients. Having experienced this
with my babies, I could totally relate. Then came the big question -
would I be willing to foster the kitten for a week so she could gain
a little weight and strengthen her immune system? Perhaps I should
have told them I have four boys. Germ-wise, the kitten probably had a
better chance with the older cats. But they loaded me up with food,
litter and other accouterment and, the next thing I knew, I was
headed home with a kitten I thought I wasn't keeping.
I called Bo to tell him my tale of woe
and his response was, "I think we need to keep the cat."
Wait, what?
He told me that the morning before I
took the kitten to the shelter, he had the feeling that we needed to
keep her. But he thought that was a crazy idea because we just got
done telling each other that we didn't want a pet. So he figured if
there was any reason why the shelter couldn't take the kitten, he
would take that as confirmation that we were supposed to keep her. He
was not at all surprised when I brought her home.
So we sat the children down and let
them know we were keeping her. Bo had the good idea to make the kids
sign a contract acknowledging their responsibility in taking care of
her. Then began the long process of deciding on a name for her.
Thousands of names, many from beloved books, were debated.
"Mrs. Darcy?!? What kind of name
is that for a cat?!?"
"How about Schroedinger?"
"What?"
"We can't keep calling her
Boromir! It's a girl!"
Eventually, Bo had to put a deadline in
place. I would like to introduce you to our new family member
Katniss.
 |
| No Grandma B, we're not shipping the cat to you. |
I still think we should have named her
Mailman Mike.
