Remembering Sweet Claude …

August 19, 2013September 12, 2013 / still a dreamer / 8 Comments

In Memory of Claude

July 1998 – August 17, 2013
Rescued from Hillside, NJ RR bridge – August 1998

He had only 3 places to go. Over the fence and a 100′ drop to the railroad tracks below, into the traffic crossing the railroad bridge, or into my hands. He chose to climb the fence. Thanks to the help of a kind passerby, the tiny feral kitten ended up in my hands. In fact, he ended up squalling loudly while I held him against my left shoulder with one hand and drove the rest of the way to work. It was a day when I normally didn’t come in to work, on a route I never went but for the backed-up traffic that day. I even passed him by, thinking he was a crumpled piece of paper – that’s how tiny he was – before my brain went “KITTEN!” and I backed up for a closer look.

In our Medical Dept., he was assessed at 5 weeks old, too young to get shots and at risk of becoming very ill in the city shelter. So I decided to take care of him until he was old enough to be adopted. He stayed with me in my office during the day and I took him home at night. I’d set him up a huge dog crate with blankets, food, water, litter – everything he needed. He was so tiny I was afraid he’d get lost or trapped somewhere in the house. And he screamed. I shut the door to the room, let him out, and Claude made a beeline for my pit bull terrier Chloe’s chin and curled up underneath. From that moment on they became inseparable … he found the mom he’d always needed.

My thoughts of putting him up for adoption in the shelter were abandoned in the face of their devotion to each other, and that’s how Claude’s life began – loved by his dog and human moms.

Claude was a healthy and very happy, easygoing guy. He survived Chloe, who passed away at 15-1/2, as well as his two cat buddies Mewsette and Gypsy Rose who left us in the last year and a half. He was without a doubt the nudgiest animal I’ve ever known, but also beyond affectionate, cuddly, funny and extremely trusting. He stretched out anywhere on his back, totally vulnerable, knowing he was always safe and loved. And did I mention vocal? We won’t even go there.

Life was sweet for Claude until a little over a week ago when he experienced a mild, seizure-like event. Unfortunately, these progressed rapidly and in number and severity that it became clear there was only one thing to do. I told him where we were going Saturday morning and what would be happening. I bathed us in white light and asked who would meet Claude on the other side. In a heartbeat I saw Chloe … her bunny ears up, eyes bright, and she was dancing from side to side, so eager to see her “baby” once again.

Claude left peacefully in a second to join his mom and left me to reflect on how lucky I, as well as he, was that day when I was sent to work the “back way” and over a railroad bridge where someone needed desperately to be found.

Home will never be the same without you, Claudie.

Farewell, Gypsy Rose

April 8, 2013 / still a dreamer / 6 Comments

In Memory … Gypsy Rose

July 1999 – April 6, 2013
Rescued from Weequahic Park, Newark, NJ – January 2000

Gypsy Rose was a 6 month-old kitten when I (literally) grabbed her from a parking area in Weequahic Park on my way to work. She was with her mother, and it is likely the two were living in the cemetery on the other side of the wrought iron fence just a few feet away. I was unable to get the more street-wise mother, but brought this little tyke into my car. I buried my head under my arms against the steering wheel, while the kitten ricocheted all over my car. When she finally settled at the rear window, I drove the rest of the way to the shelter where I worked and where she would get a chance at a real home.

Gypsy’s “baby” picture … 6 months old in the shelter, waiting for love.

She was written up in the system, and placed in a cage in the area just inside the front entrance – prime real estate for adoption. There was a multitude of reasons why bringing another animal into my home at that exact time was a very poor idea, and since Gypsy Rose was cute as a button and only 6 months old, I was sure it was only a matter of time before someone would fall in love and adopt her.

But there she sat. After six months and no one expressing an interest in her, among other reasons, I knew she was meant to be mine, and the rest is history. Soon after walking into my home, Gypsy decided she should run the place thus earning herself the name of Miss Bossy Boots. All went well for this petite Queen of Everything until about October 2011, when she experienced seizure-like activity and was put on medication to reduce swelling from a possible tumor or cancer in her brain. This event repeated itself in June of 2012 when we tried to wean her off the medication.

Still, Gypsy forged on, unfazed by some growing malignancy within. In the last few months, however, Gypsy began a slow downward and irreversible decline. In the last few weeks, I watched her behaviors change, isolating herself more, eating less and less, rallying occasionally, until it became clear her time had come. She left peacefully in my arms, loved `til the end.

Farewell, Gypsy girl … you will always be home in my heart.

My Main Excuse …

March 18, 2013March 18, 2013 / still a dreamer / 4 Comments

There are times when we, as bloggers, have nothing to say. That is rarely my problem. There are times when we have so much to say, we don’t know where to start. Getting warmer. Or so much to say and we don’t know if we should say it. Bingo.

So my main excuse for not posting is pictured at left.

Gypsy Rose, one of my cats, is not doing well. She has an incurable illness, something in her brain such as cancer, a tumor, etc. that only a $900 – $1800 cat MRI would reveal. We are treating her symptomatically, (as would be the case even if we did have a precise diagnosis, as brain surgery isn’t a viable alternative on a cat, or at least this one), and rather successfully, until recently, when she began to not do so well.

The vet and I are trying an adjustment in her medication to see if that will help her.

Either way, an animal with ups and downs every day is a reminder that we cannot control life and death; we cannot make any being stay longer than it is their time to spend, no matter how good our intentions; it is a reminder that we are human and have engaged in a relationship with an animal who looks to us to always make the right decision for them.

That time has not yet come for little Miss Rose, but I believe if she … and any of my other animals, past and present, could say so, they would say they always felt safest in my hands. Or at least I’d like to think so.

But so as not to be overly serious, (or premature), in what may come in the days, weeks or months ahead, I offer a favorite cat quote in a lighter vein:

The problem with cats is that they get the exact same look on their face whether they see a moth or an axe-murderer. ~Paula Poundstone

But maybe to the heart of the matter …

The dog may be wonderful prose, but only the cat is poetry. ~French Proverb

Mysterious Creatures, Cats

February 13, 2013 / still a dreamer / 4 Comments

Now tell me … is the sun really all that much better under the dining room chair?

One of the things we love about dogs is that they are straightforward. Pretty much what you see is what you get. But cats? they trump most animals in the category of inscrutable, the kings and queens of unfathomable motives. With a wide swath of carpet bathed in sunlight this morning, Claude chose to slink himself in between the chair rails and sat there for quite some time. After a bit, he curled up in that spot and fell asleep.

Of course, when he’s a wide open book is when he hears the electronic ignition of the gas stove click because that means cat food might be warming up. In this case, it’s a small breakfast for one of my neighbor’s cats whose day is not started without breakfast chez Jeanne. I also ponder … why, when Claude, for whatever reason, feels a need to throw up, must he make a mad dash to do so on the upstairs wall-to-wall carpeting? Is throwing up anywhere where I could easily clean it up never part of the equation?

Why has drinking water become an occasion for caterwauling at any time of day or night? OK – I might cut him a little slack on this one because he is in the beginning stages of kidney failure, and maybe his kidneys are aching for water? Sounds good, but I doubt it. When I lean down the stairs with a very loud SSSHHHHhhhhhhh! he stops immediately, as if Cher herself, a la Moonstruck, just slapped him and said “Snap out of it!” My alternative theory is senility. But again … it may just be one of those things that cats do for reasons even they can’t fathom. Lucky for him, he has many other redeeming qualities including being cute as a button.

Now Gypsy Rose never shows her hand in the slightest bit. Whatever she’s thinking? You don’t know until she acts, like when, out of the blue, she just smacks Claude for apparently nothing. And then walks away.

So while he’s being silly under the dining room chair, she simply looks at him with disdain then returns her gaze to her kingdom, (queendom?), on the other side of the window. She has bigger fish to fry, like making our world safe from renegade cats that might walk across the porch. Lucky for them they’re beyond her reach.

Here’s Looking at You, Kid!

September 17, 2012 / still a dreamer / 6 Comments

Finally! Work subsided sufficiently that my blogging brain returned and I knew what I was going to write for a post as soon as I got the chance. But in the meantime, something else happened.

In the afternoon, the western sun bathes my office and upstairs bedrooms in warmth and light. Great in cooler weather, not so much in the summer. Anyway, about noon or so each day I go upstairs and open all the windows facing that way so as to soak up as much heat as possible to stave off the chill of the cooler autumn evenings and nights. In the back bedroom, Claude was soaking up that sun on top of a piece of furniture, too, but seemingly oblivious to the fact that he was being closely watched!

Then he realized … it moved! As I moved with my camera, the praying mantis got into prayer/attack position and rotated his head to keep an eye on me. Claude was interested only when he moved, which I suspect has something to do with an animal’s depth perception or ability to comprehend something on the other side of both screen and glass.

These creatures are so bizarre looking, but so fascinating. If they are symbols of good luck, which has been said to me, then I ought to be in for one big bucket-o-luck anytime soon!

Claude, below, not quite knowing what to make of this slow-moving creature. (I’ll get to that other post real soon. This was too good to pass up!)