Walking with Dogs, Angels

I see people walking their dogs on my drive home from taking the kids to school, and I think, How can they do that? Aren't they scared?"

Yet walking is my preferred form of exercise. I used to love to walk my dog, though I was always nervous when large dogs barked and lunged at gates as we passed.

Then one day while passing a house, a pit bull or boxer mix ran out and attacked our dog, Taz. Danny, my little boy, was with us on his scooter. I yelled at him to ignore the dog and to stay away, and he cried as he watched the big dog grab our terrier by the neck and shake him in its mouth twice, maybe three times. I thought Taz was going to be killed, and that my little son would have that terrible memory of watching his pet being throttled to death. The lady who ran after the big dog did not know how to control it and did very little except to squirt water from a bottle onto its muscalur neck. Then she asked me to pick up my own dog. I am ashamed to say that I didn't want to, terrified that her animal would turn on me. When I finally grabbed Taz, the larger dog stalked us, eyes concentrated on my poor furry friend. I told Danny to go ahead of us, to keep his distance, but at one point, as the other animal still trailed us, I looked around, rotating, and cried aloud, "Where can we go? Where can we go?"

I was not very brave, and later I agonized over how well I protected Danny by merely telling him to stay away from Taz and me and the other dog. I also wondered why, in situations where I find myself controlled by fear, I do not cry out silently to God for guidance. For I have asked him for guidance in other situations, and often his answer has been instantaneous.

However, with my wail of, Where can we go?,  there came an answer. Two good Samaritans, male neighbors of the woman, showed up. One had a garden rake or broom in his hand, and he used it to keep the dog away from us. Then he brusquely told the woman to grab the dog by his collar. As she did so I wondered why neither of us had thought of that. I wondered for no more than a moment, though, because I was busy telling Danny to go quickly on the scooter to stay ahead of me as we made our retreat. Sobbing, I did turn my head as we went, and threw several garbled thank yous back at those gentlemen.

Our dog survived that attack, and as I bathed him that morning, I did not even find the blood and lacerations I was fully expecting. I can only think that his long hair and collar offered protection. I was a bit of a mess as I told my husband of the events and later a close friend on the phone.

We never ventured down that street again. Trying to walk my dog after that, I kept a golf club close at my side, but the excursions became successively shorter and closer to home. I was terrified of another incident and became even more fearful for my children's safety, something with which I already struggle a great deal. Several homes in the neighborhood have large dogs who are kept confined much of the time, making them aggressive I suspect.

Nevertheless, our dog still desires walks, and he would prefer it if we actually journeyed more than a few yards each way down our street.

One Sunday I caved in when my kids begged to take Taz on a walk. My husband opted out; walks bore him. I wanted him to come, because fear holds little sway with him, but I comforted myself that Berto, my big twelve-year-old boy, had more than triple my courage in hairy situations.

The loop around the block went alright until we got down the main drag and saw a little black dog running free. Our Taz goes spastic in the presence of cats or other dogs, so I picked him up in order to avoid even the smallest fight. As we rounded the corner onto our street, we no longer saw the other critter, but I still nervously scanned the road as I cradled Taz in my arms. Then just as we passed a home with an open gate, a pit bull charged out at us.

Fear grabs me by the neck in such cases, making my eyes bulge as everything seems to happen simultaneously at lightning speed and agonizingly slow. Foolish woman, I had been walking too fast in my anxiety and was ahead of all my children, though not much. I turned and saw the animal brush past my kids, and I thought clearly, He is going to bite one of my children!

Out of the corner of my eye I saw someone off to the left on a bike, someone we had not seen on the street when we turned. The dog charged the person and then without any perceivable cause abruptly turned tail and ran back inside the gate.

I was already telling my children to come NOW! Ella took off on her scooter. Daniel was fumbling with his, so I told him to leave it; we would come back, and I grabbed his little wrist in a vice grip and trotted with him toward the house. Ana followed us close behind, and Berto grabbed the scooter and brought up our rear, holding the metal toy at the ready.

The dog never came back out. Daniel rebelled against my propulsion.

"You're hurting me, Mama!" he cried. I hadn't meant to, but I was desperate not to let my littlest one be in another scary situation.

As for the biker, our friend, he came slowly behind us, an empty baby trailer attached to his bike. Realizing his pace and that he was basically securing our escape, I turned and said breathlessly, "Thank you for being braver than I am."

He responded by saying he was glad he was there.

Ella said, "That was a pit bull, wasn't it?"

He nodded. "It doesn't help the perceptions people have about them, huh?"

We were at our house, and he paused at the sidewalk by our property and said, "My buddy lives there. I need to tell him about that." He pulled out his cellphone and gazed at it for a moment. I thanked him again, and then the kids, Taz and I went inside and started spilling the story to Matthew. I pulled back the curtain as I told him of the man, but he was already gone. Again, as always, I agonized aloud over how quickly I had reacted, how I could have better protected my kids. Gratefully, I turned to Berto and thanked him for keeping a cool head and bringing up the rear, protecting his siblings. I scolded Matthew for not coming with us. He responded that I needed to let it go; we were safe, and there was no use in beating the subject to death.

Late that night I lay awake in bed thinking about the strangeness of the morning's encounter: how we didn't notice the bicyclist on the street until after we saw the dog ---(Did he come from the other direction? Where did he come from?)---; how neither the pit bull nor Taz made any noise at each other; how the pit bull inexplicably ran back inside the fence after confronting the man on the bike; how I never heard the bicyclist shout anything at that muscular animal to frighten it; how the dog never ventured back out as we walked the remaining several yards down the street even though the gate stood gaping, and we were a noisy, anxious bunch; and how the man followed us with his empty baby trailer to our home and paused as we went in.

I also reflected on how my prayers for my children had changed since our car accident a few years ago. I felt at the time that their angels kept them completely free from harm, and that changed my prayers. I began not simply to pray to God for his protection over my kids' each day but to pray more specifically that their angels would walk with, watch over, and guard them.

Was that man one of those guardian angels? Laugh if you like. My husband looked as if he thought it wasn't a sound idea when I confided in him the next morning....and yet after the man supposedly called his "buddy", the yard gate still remained open that whole day.

Yes, I know. He probably wasn't a supernatural being, but I think of him often with gratitude, because I do not doubt one bit that, angel or no, his presence at that moment on a Sunday morning made a big difference for my family.


Some time ago a priest asked me to compose a personal prayer for peace, because he rightly discerned, I think, that I am often restless, passionate, and fearful - controlled by my emotions. I liked his idea, so I built one from several Scripture passages that had spoken to me reassuringly. This was that prayer, and I pray it or some form of it often when my emotions hold too great a sway over me or my fears nag me with a plague of ugly pictures:

Where sin increased Grace overflowed all the more

Lord Jesus, give me your peace

Let not my heart be troubled

Neither let it be afraid

But send the Holy Spirit

To give me courage

In every circumstance

Amen

Fifth Baby

"Look at mommy. C'mon, look at me! Just look at the camera. No - stay still. Come back! There, stay there. Look at the camera." Click! "Why did you turn your head, goofball? Let's try again. Sit still now. No, don't jump down! Just look at mommy - please stay!"

I was following my blond-haired, black-eyed baby around to get a good picture. He doesn't understand the camera. He's not a ham. He just wants to lie about like a good-for-nothing and take naps on my couch pillows or lick people's knees. But I really wanted a picture bad, because my boy had just been to the groomer's, and he looked so darn handsome with his new cut.

Yeah, I think you know who I mean.

I never knew I wanted a fifth baby. I mean, I was always looking around for one when I was out, because four kids seems like so many children that even when my four were standing in front of me at the mall or park, responding to their names impatiently, I was still turning my head this way and that to look for their imaginary sibling who had no doubt run off somewhere.

Then we found him about a year ago. Taz was a little scruffy, a little too hyper, and I was afraid he would bite my kids' toes or fingers off in the night for the first couple weeks. For a whole month I wondered why we decided to take him when our sleep had just begun to resemble that of well-rested human beings. I even debated whether we could give him back. He used to pee on the floor or table without so much as an, "Excuse me, if you don't mind..." He threw up on my beautiful red couch right before Thanksgiving - not a pile but a river. When we left him home alone, he redesigned our front window curtains with his claws, leaving them in tatters, and several weeks later he pulled the back curtains out the doggy door and ripped them plum in half. He attacked my son's stuffed Elmo and put the death bite on a poor howler monkey toy on numerous occasions. He nipped a real Rottweiler in the face when I took him out for a bit of air and sunshine.

He just can't play nice with other kids. He's a permanent toddler.

But Taz has the most gorgeous blond/gray/tan/red hair and a sweet, if insecure, disposition. I'm not sure whether he looks more like me or Matthew. (But I suspect me; we both have big noses and shaggy hair.) Sure we have to take him out to use the potty every night late, but he'll let me play with his soft ears and rub his narrow little nose to my heart's content without an, "Awww, Mom!". He loves to play with the bigger kids and only bites when they try to steal his toys. He's our fifth baby....but, sadly, when I tell him to go to Papa, Matthew objects, "I am not that dog's papa!"

I used to make fun of people who said their dog was their baby. Oh, brother, was my thought as I smiled haughtily at their benign insanity. It's only because the poor dears have never had real kids that they can be so delusional!

Now, I'm the one in the funny farm with my furry friend, because I often call Tazzy to me with, "Come to Mama!", or when I'm sitting squeezing his little face in my hands, I pronounce warmly, "Mommy wuves her wittle buddy. Yes, I do!" Maybe I'm experiencing post-baby-years depression, because our youngest, Danny Sam, is over 4 and closer to kindergarten than to first steps.

This fifth-child-is-the-family-dog complex wouldn't be so bad, I guess, if I didn't sometimes call him by our kids' names, or - worse yet - call one of them Tazzy.

Still, I suppose it's a kind of release. I can parent this dog any way I wish. There is no Dr. Sears to make me feel guilty - ha! I can practice bad parenting monologues of frustration with Taz and never feel one bit bad or guilty. I can say something like, "Nobody loves poor Tazzy. I've asked them; I've asked around. I've asked everybody - not one of them! But that's okay, that's okay. You'll survive, huh?" And I can say it with a calm smile, and he just looks back at me appreciatively...or ignores me completely while he strategizes how to get his next slice of cheese.

Anyhow, this reflection on my love of animals, of this Yorkie dog in particular, began on Thursday when I picked him up at the groomer and saw how gorgeous my little fellar was with his little Yorkie beard and stubby tail and soft fur. Who knew I loved this dog so much when he was a greasy, bushy mess with hair falling in his eyes and grass stuck to his belly? Now that he's all chic I want to proudly parade him round the neighborhood in a pair of cheap sunglasses, responding to any smiles with, "That's my boy!" And I just can't wait to introduce him to my folks when they come visit in a week; I know they're going to love him! (Right, Dad?)

Another advantage to having this baby dog in my life? My need to share pictures of my absolutely beautiful children with indifferent strangers has long been unfulfilled, because my husband refuses to allow me to do so here - and I can't say I blame him.

But he never said nothin' 'bout the dog.

Death in the family

My precious Ana lost her pet dwarf hamster this past week. Sometime Tuesday night or Wednesday day, the little guy climbed up the tunnel to his potty place, a detachable box lined with paper towels, and passed away.

Twice on Wednesday afternoon, post-school, she came to me, concerned that she had not heard Nike up all day. The first time I didn't think too much about it, but the second time she added that he was lying on his side and not moving.

"Uh-oh."

I hastily went to investigate. The very moment I laid eyes on his tiny stiff body I knew he was dead.

So began the tears from both my girls...and from me. My Analisa, such a quiet, easy child, cries in a way most women could never compete with when she is very upset; with mouth wide, eyes shut, face raised up and stretched thin, the wails build to ever greater pitch. When her favorite uncle, Steve, left after a visit this past spring, she wept and wailed to such a degree on the drive home from the airport that both my sons clamped hands over ears and slid down in their seats, and my husband kept turning up the radio every two seconds, giving up when even its deafening sound could not drown her out. So he told her bluntly and most unsympathetically that she could be sad but not hysterical - in other words: cry silently, for heavens sake.

Her wails over her little friend were not that bad, but close. My husband kept his patience as he hugged both the girls, and I cried silently with them as I murmured, "I know. I know," and thought of all my pet friends who had left me.

Ana had taken very good care of Nike, her gift from us on her 8th birthday - changing his food each night, checking his water, and cleaning his cage, usually with my help but the last time all by herself. She held him often over the summer and put him in his ball for exercise. When the busy days of school started, it was harder but she tried every day to spend time with him. Both of us loved when he sat on hind legs on our laps and cleaned his face with his minute paws, and Ana used to hold him up to my face and her own so he could give "kissies", sniffing our faces and tickling our cheeks with his rodent whiskers. Nike was her first animal friend.

I regret that I had not held him lately, something I often did at first and especially because Berto and Matthew would never hold "that rat". I'm disappointed that our new Yorkie friend kept trying to eat him whenever the cage came down, making it harder for us to spend time with the first pet in our family, an elderly friend. He had lived with two families before us, and hamsters don't live that long. Ana had said to me many times in recent days, "I'm worried about Nike." He had not consented to be held very often or easily in the past couple weeks, instead burrowing under his bedding. Thankfully, the day before he left us, she was able to pick him up, pet him and put him in his ball for some exercise.

I should have held him that last day - busy doing dishes - but I'm grateful Analisa did.

"You got to hold him yesterday, right?" I said gently. "And he had a last good run in his ball."

"At least his grave will be his last good burrow," she said with a sad little smile.

Ana found her Girl Scouts bandana, earned by selling cookies, and we all went into the backyard. Her papa picked up Nike's little body and wrapped him in Ana's special bandana. Only his half-shut eyes and small grey head showed as Matthew held him out for Ana and each of us to say good-bye (I had to nudge Berto who had been complaining about the smell and was still trying to plug his nose). I sobbingly read the end of Watership Down as the dirt was placed, a tradition my dad started at the passing of all my childhood rabbit friends. Then we all got big rocks to lay across the tiny tomb so Taz, our Yorkie, wouldn't dig him up. Ana wrote his name on one, Neiki to her, and God Bless You on another. We did not put an Adidas symbol on our little friend's grave, as a certain sarcastic someone had once suggested.

It was only a little while later that my girls showed me a hummingbird perched on some dead branches of our African sumac tree, under which Nike is now buried. The tiny creature didn't fly even as the sliding glass door slid shut and we approached close beneath.

"Do you think he came to comfort us?" asked Analisa.

He stayed there for some time, a beautiful presence in the early evening light, and with my arms wrapped around my girls, I replied, "Maybe he did."

Befirrfin the Fierce

This is the second installment of  To all the pets I've loved before...Feline Friends

Leo, my Mama's best-loved cat, had the coveted position of fifth child in our family - all the love and attention with no real responsibility and no threat of discipline. We were a teeny bit jealous, we other four. He thought he was her true baby, a human being even, because from the day he was born she bottle-fed, held and comforted him. Like Dr. Seuss's Horton the Elephant, she was faithful 100%.

My mother nicknamed him Befirrfin the Fierce (though when she called him so, it sounded decidedly babyish). His fur was white and soft gray with tiny patches of black and tan, and his eyes were close in shade to my dad's - what my mom very jokingly referred to one time as "cow pie green". Large and muscular, much larger than the tiny creature who bore him, he was a hunter and a fighter. He got in a nasty fight with some stray tom once, and it cost him a chunk of his ear. And he used to come into my room just to mess with my black rabbit Freddy. Freddy, too, was a brave, adventure-seeking soul. My lop-eared friend blocked Leo from entering his domain, and they used to stare each other down, jumping and padding back and forth until Leo took a few swats and then swaggered away until another day. I swear he smiled; he just loved riling Freddy.

By far, though, the greatest battle Befirrfin ever fought, the one that won the gratitude and admiration of all our family, was against The Rat. It was a rodent of legendary proportions that lived beneath our stove in our little L-shaped kitchen. You could hear it shifting its weight around back there in the evening; shivers went down your spine and your toes curled. Sometimes you caught flashes of brown by the back. Leo spent many nights sitting with his pale eyes fixated on the space between the wall and the stove, creeping closer. An epic battle was bound to happen, but I, for one, always hoped I wouldn't be caught in the middle of it.

It occurred one night when I was in bed, thankfully. The noise of it, the hissing, thumping, running, clattering cacophony, roused my parents, because their room was adjacent to the kitchen. Mama got up, Dad said, ready to rush to her baby's aide. Dad made her lie back down. "Leo will take care of it."

It was about time for that hideous rodent to be gone.

When we got up in the morning, Leo was calm and collected, acting as if, despite some scrapes, nothing momentous had occurred. The large rat was lying dead and bloody on the kitchen floor, more hideous in that state than I had imagined it alive in all its glory. We could finally be rid of it - after a good deal of clean-up.

Though we were all so glad the wicked Rat was dead, it was not only undesirable rodents that Leo stalked. I can still see him sitting in the corner of our old living room, batting at a moth or butterfly that had come in. We kids tried in vain to pull him away from the pretty insect several times, but Leo was fascinated and the look in his eye savage as he decimated its wings. We tattled on him to Mama, and her sharp response was, "If Leo wants to catch a butterfly, let him catch a butterfly."

Still, the hunter/fighter was the only part of his nature Mama feared, because it pulled him away from her. Even with all our extensive yard and the field to roam, Leo's wanderlust got stronger as he got older. Due to a few extended absences, his forays into adventure had to be supervised in case he got ideas of vanishing. Mama was very upset any time we exclaimed, "Leo's loose!". Out into the yard she dashed, and if Leo was still around prowling the edge of the yard, her negotiations with him began. Poor wanderer, you could see the war of thoughts in his tense body, wide, intelligent eyes and constant ear twitch as he looked from Mama to the lane or field and back again. He paced and sat, paced and sat - wanting to race to freedom but unable to ignore the person he loved above everything. Many times we watched her approach him slowly, speaking softly and persuasively, and then she snatched him up into her arms when she was near enough. Our scolding for letting him out soon followed.

Though Leo was the bold and pugnacious Befirrfin the Fierce, with Mama he was just a big baby. She draped that large cat over her shoulder to pet him, and he melted into her gradually, his body going limp until he began to drool with happiness. When she turned away from you, you could see the moisture on her shirt. Until he died she held him that way, and it was his favorite way to be caressed and cuddled. If I held him as she did and by chance he drooled down my back, it was a great honor. At least I felt so.

When we moved to Boise, Idaho, life was harder for the few pets we had still. It was cramped. It was city life, and that is an abysmal change for anyone used to running around in the country (I cried alot). The smells are different, and sometimes they are more diverse and exciting because of the plethora of creatures cramped within a square mile. In Idaho, Leo felt the old urge to seek a fight, a brief escape, and Mama had the usual work of persuading him to come back.

It was in Idaho that Leo's habit of following Mama around grew worse. Wherever she went he was behind her. She wore nothing but heels, my mother, and so if while doing laundry or making dinner she had to turn and grab something, there was almost always a yelp of pain from her beloved cat-son. He never learned, and it didn't matter how many times she scolded, "Leo!" It didn't matter how many times my dad admonished, "Honey, you have to watch where you're stepping!" He remained at her feet, as close as he could get, and Mama always expected him to move in time or not be lying within danger. Sometimes after such accidents, she pressed him to her face in apology for a few moments and then carried him off to my dad. If that didn't work he spent time on her shoulder, drooling. Probably, that's what he wanted all along.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I wasn't home the day Befirrfin the Fierce died. I was living in Virginia, as I recall, when Dad phoned to tell my sister and me the news. He had health problems for a while, so it wasn't a shock. Yet I regretted not seeing him again, felt like another strong tie to our life in Tennessee was gone, and I knew my mama was inconsolable. I remember Dad being jealous, saying half in jest that he wondered if she would cry as hard over him as she did over Leo.


Dad buried Leo at the roots of a potted tree, so my mother could carry him wherever she went, knowing he was enriching another life. Two years ago I watched my dad turn the earth and finally transplant that tree, for a sojourn, into my aunt and uncle's yard in a little town in Idaho. We were all quiet and respectful as Papa draped his arm over my mom's shoulders, a moment of silence for Leo. There Befirrfin will remain, and there the tree will flourish, until Mom and Dad come back to claim them.




Dedicated to Mama Darlin'. I hope she will forgive me if I didn't do justice to her Leo.

To all the pets I've loved before...Feline Friends

Right now in my life there are 6am walks in my pajamas, long stares at meal times, eager greetings after time spent away and little minefields in the backyard. A friend's pug, Buster, is staying with us for a couple of weeks. Last night I sat by this well-mannered dog (excepting the puppy eyes during meal times), and I rubbed his ears, his neck and belly for a contented long while as I spoke to him in a ridiculous cartoon voice. It felt familiar and comfortable and how life should be....which of course reminded me of how life was once upon a time.

I speak of Tennessee - I haven't done that for a while. We had more than a few animals over several years who were a big part of our lives at the rural home of my childhood. Recently, anticipating Buster's arrival, my kids allowed me to skip down memory lane of a morning, enthusiastically tugging them behind me as I told tales of four-legged, cherished companions.

Of course, there was Reuben, that great Lab who was my dad's beloved friend. There was his dear and simultaneously annoying friend Mandy, the half-blind, almost deaf mutt, who savaged a man's cowboy boot - while his foot was in it - and drew blood. I'm not ashamed to say I was glad of it. The man - cropped, mousy hair, thick glasses and constant leering grin - was not young, but he was hitting on my teenage sister. He deserved what he got, and I myself, a little girl warily watching this sleazy guy with my arms crossed tightly, was considering sinking my teeth into him if he didn't leave my sister alone. Mandy persuaded him to do that, and to leave our presence altogether and quickly.

There was Pepe Slugeater, a cat. He wasn't anyone's favorite pet, but he was memorable because, as his name implies, he was a devourer of slugs. He'd discover one in the evening and squat over it to have himself a lovely, slimy feast. As his fur became matted about the face, even gluing one eye shut, he only broke his repast to growl madly at every human and animal who ventured near, warning them to go find their own delicious slug and leave him alone.

Very early on in our life on those ninety-eight acres in the country, there were the cat brothers, Tommy and Sammy. We went to a neighbor's house to adopt them. They were half-feral kittens, so we had to chase and corner them before we could take them home. Dad did most of the running. Just as we had the brothers in hand, one would leap loose, and as that one was caught, the other would break free. Though Tommy was the quickest and most elusive, I remember my dad becoming completely exasperated when Sammy escaped my grasp, but after some exhausting exercise, we finally had them both in the car and headed home.

They were polar opposites. Tommy wanted nothing to do with anybody. He'd sit his fluffy black and white body on the windowsill, aching to desert the house for the greater outdoors. And he did leave often for days at a time until we found him and brought him home. That is until the day he left for good and never came back. Months later my sister Vinca, who loved him dearly, thought she saw him on the far side of a pond in Mr. Spann's field. She called Tommy's name, and the cat sat for several minutes and watched at her as she crept nearer, but then he bolted. We never saw him again.

Sammy's fur was not a stark contrast of colors like Tommy's but a smattering of soft shades on white, and he was a complete love bug. He ached not for adventure but for attention. We could put doll dresses on him, and he'd let us shift his head, legs and arms this way and that while doing so without ever extending a claw or baring a tooth. We'd play house, and he was our baby and an easy one, too. I'm afraid we teased Sammy quite alot, something Tommy wouldn't allow without a sharp, in claws, rebuttal. I don't remember what happened to sweet Sammy, though I believe feline leukemia claimed him.


There was our much-loved but crazy Pookie who came to us after, a birthday gift for my sis I think, and she was truly out of her mind, poor creature. Once, she stalked me across my own bedroom with such a sinister look in her eye that I was honestly afraid as I jumped from one piece of furniture to the next until I reached the door and escaped, breathing hard. I locked her in my room until she could regain her senses, what remained of them.

Pookie was a small cat, my sister Vinca's cat, and she lived a hard life. She spent several long evenings when she was a youngster in heat "yowling for mates" as we called it. That was a terrible ruckus, and it happened each night outside our bedroom windows. It seemed that there wasn't a single desperate tomcat within five miles who would court her. We made jokes about it, but it was also a little sad. Finally, there was a big unfamiliar tom loitering about the house, and he must have been a lover; Pookie was soon pregnant.

When she had her first and only litter of kittens, we all watched with proper fascination the machinations of life, but Vinca was especially solicitous of Pookie's comfort. It was soon clear things would not go smoothly. After the first kitten came, tiny Lizzy, Pookie delivered her uterus along with Lizzy's much bigger brother, Leo. A third kitten we could see was dead in the womb. My parents rushed Pookie off to the nearest vet who stitched her up, but when the kittens tried to nurse from their Mama late one night, the stitches popped open. Everything and more was exposed, all purple and rose and moist, and my parents had to make another run to a vet to save her. Unfortunately, the only vet they could find at that late hour was a specialist in large animals, particularly horses. He gave her far too many meds, an overdose really. We were told to keep her on a bed beneath a lamp; I'm not sure why. She lay for at least a couple days beneath the light, her eyes wide but her body unresponsive. We kids came to stare at this strange zombiefied cat every hour or so.

Meanwhile, my mother carefully fed the babies with an eyedropper, and they slept in a tiny cardboard box lined with soft material. On a chilly morning we woke up and went to check the kittens. Leo was snuggled on top of his little sister. Mom lifted him aside quickly, afraid, and found that Lizzy, precious and tiny, was dead. My mother cried for some time, but once we buried little Lizzy, her mothering instincts exerted themselves powerfully for lonely Leo.

When Pookie woke up from those meds, she was not the same. We were told to keep her in a mesh cage for a while, so she couldn't exert herself, but to let the kitten go in to suckle. Pookie wouldn't have anything to do with that. We did try to get her interested in her Leo, but she only hissed violently at him every time he appeared.

A strange enmity had developed between them. He no longer believed she was nor desired her to be his mother, and she no longer believed that she was a mom at all - and certainly not to this obnoxious young cat. That peculiar distrust and dislike continued their whole lives together. Leo used to lay in wait to pounce on her, and not in a playful way. She shrieked and swatted at him. It was odd and sad that they could hate each other so much.

But almost from the moment of his birth, my mom had become Leo's beloved adoptive mother, and he my mother's beloved pet. I'm certain he thought he was human, her fifth and most loved child.

Continued in the next post, Befirrfin the Fierce


Until then, you might enjoy A Dad and His Dog...and Mandy