The Story of a Cat

Fourteen years ago I was running late for a meeting. While I was driving I was going over the presentation in my head thinking about all the possible objections I might need to overcome. As my mind cycled through the responses something small, rat sized, scampered across the road in front of me. When I passed the intersection point I looked in my side mirror and saw a kitten at the edge of the asphalt. Damn, I can’t stop I thought!

Pulling into a driveway, I watched as this tiny creature moved into the bush. Understand, I am not a cat person, but I am a softy, the father of daughters so a big softy and a firm believer in Karma. I couldn’t leave one of God’s helpless creatures on the side of the road, I didn’t need to piss God off. Calling my client, I told her about the kitten that needed rescuing (fortunately she was a cat person so big brownie points) and that I would reschedule when I got this “situation situated”.

Grabbing a t-shirt out of my gym bag, I approached the spot where I saw the kitten enter. When I saw her a wave of emotions sweep over me. She couldn’t have been more than weeks old but she arched her back and hissed at me to defend her turf. Throwing my t-shirt over her, I wrapped her up and took her to the car. I held her in my lap traveling the short distance to my home. She was very quiet and very still, looking up at me from time to time with her tiny kitten eyes.

Here is the plan I formulated on the drive; I would put her in a box in the garage, head to my meeting, comeback and take her to the animal shelter, we simply didn’t need a cat. Finding a deep box, one I was confident she couldn’t jump out of, I placed the kitten inside with my t-shirt and pushed it in the corner out of sight in case my wife and daughters came home. I didn’t need them falling in love with this cute creature. Walking in the house, I washed my hands and then, the garage door opened. Oh crap I thought, they are home. When I walked out my wife, daughters and a couple of their friends were gathered around the box. In formulating my “master plan” I didn’t take into account this little butt head would one; cry and two; scratch the side of the box trying to get out.

When I told them the story and what the “master plan” was it was resoundingly crushed by a 5 to 1 vote. Defeated, I left confident that we had a new addition to our household and that Dad and the old lab would need to figure out, quickly, how to become cat people.

After a visit to the Veterinary office my wife, kids and friends discovered she was only two weeks old, weighed one pound, had only her milk teeth, was covered in fleas and had all sorts and types of worms. A true bundle of joy. For the next month or so, my wife feed “Peaches” some sort of expensive magic kitten elixir with an eye-dropper three times a day. Overtime she grew, topping out at a whopping five pounds of bad-ass and completely devoted to one person and only one person in our home. I will let you guess who it isn’t.

Fourteen years later, the kids are gone. The old lab has been replaced by two mutts that act like three year old’s and queen Peaches still rules, ignoring me, the man who saved her and curling up with her mother every night at bedtime. I hope God is happy with me.