Sam’s cat story
In this morning’s e-mail:
Hello,
A scrawny cream colored, with brownish ears, face, and tail, kitten-cat came to our back patio yesterday just before dark. He yammered loudly and continuously, so I fed him quite a bit of chicken. He was extremely affectionate. He devoured the chicken, ate a huge amount. Then, he spent the next few hours trying to figure out a way to get inside, staring through the glass with his blue eyes with ruby pupils, caressing it with his head, climbing up the screen in pitiful appeals to be let in. Josey was disturbed, highly attentive for a good long while, but not angry after the first several minutes of rubbing noses through the window screen.
The kitten finally went to sleep in one of the the big flower pots (now just dirt) in front of the left window beside the front door. I managed to put out a cat bed for him about mid-night–he was sleeping there for hours as I checked on him during the night. Before daylight, I checked again, and he was gone. Then I noticed he was curled up in front of my office door at the rear of the house. Then I noticed that Bailey, the neighbor’s cat was stalking him, hunting him like he was a bird or something. The little fellow was oblivious to it all, like some kind of ka-diddle-hopper goof walking into a biker bar. Bailey is a very efficient killer, no nonsense, switchblade character–we know this from watching her do her thing to some of our critters out back the last two summers.
I went to get the flashlight, to try to shine it to blow Bailey’s stalk, as a way to help the kitten (not wanting to get too involved and end up taking on another cat for the house although Andrea was all for it), but by the time I got back Bailey had chased the kitten into a nearby flower bed. The stand-off went on for a few minutes, with the kitten trying to make like a smiling, friendly hayseed Gomer Pyle facing a ghetto gangster or something. Bailey was not to be reconciled, though. I told myself it would all work out some way for the kitten.
Then when the kitten moved out into the lawn, Bailey chased him into another flower bed and was looming viciously over the poor little fellow in an attack mode. The kitten was trying to shrink into the earth and avoid eye contact with Bailey. Fearing for the kitten’s life, and having in mind that the chipmunks Boo and Bo have both disappeared this last week, now that Bailey is out of her owners’ house in this warmer weather, I ran to put on some old shoes and get out there, still wearing my heavy bathrobe.
The kitten came running to me and wrapped itself around my legs in a state of fright, limping on the back right leg-hip (I suspect Bailey got in a strike or two) and trying to find a way to climb up to safety. I scooped him up and went to unlock and raise the garage door to put him in there away from Josey and Bailey.
So, now what?
So far he is a noisy, leggy kitten who is eating huge amounts of food and doing fairly well at the potty routine. He is incredibly skinny, but still cute as a kitten can possibly be. He only stops meowing when he is asleep or after a long time out in the garage, or when he’s being petted. He is still in a pretty anxious state of mind for the most part. I think, however, he is going to make a very affectionate and elegant looking cat. I named him Fuzzy, but Andrea said that was too babyish for a life-time name. She wanted to name him Percy for persistence, so I convinced her to change it to Purrcy. So, Purrcy he is.
This week we will get him neutered, vaccinated, de-wormed, and otherwise examined and treated ($$$$! for sure for all that, and not at a good time for my budget, either), then we will see if we can get him to be good buddies with Josey. Purrcy seems very ready to be best buds with Josey, but Josey is on high alert and remaining non-committal.
I think if any more wretched critters, these heart-string-pulling kittens, dying things, come to our back door we are just going to have to turn away from them and let Bailey do her neighborhood enforcer work in the dark of night, with us pretending we have no idea what happened to the poor creatures. I don’t think I want to go to the local death camp shelter as a solution and see all those death row pets on their own “green mile.” It is a cruel world out there for the wee critters, for the wee kittens and cats who are suddenly alone and at the end of themselves.
