Jim Hare classic posts Archives

rescue update

Alpha sits hunkered on a towel on my desk “looking” out on the front
yard where the crepe myrtle and palms are backlit by the pale pre-
dawn sky. I wonder what she sees. The vet says she has cataracts.
We were surprised our little rescue is “ten or twelve years old”,
according to the doc.

I can’t see the cloudiness in her eyes, typical of cataracts, but I notice
she is a bit wall-eyed. Whatever, or however, she sees, it is not right.
She does not seem to focus, but rather responds to motion
peripherally. Or maybe it’s the shadows and outlines of things that
register with her. She does not react to things more than a few feet
from her, and then, not unless they move. She uses mainly her
hearing and sense of smell. She functions well with what she’s got.
A casual observer might not notice her “handicap”.

I’m used to seeing how my pets have adapted to lack, because Kashi
had cataracts in his only eye, and Tyler had only three legs. Animals
adjust without regret or remorse as far as I can tell. They don’t waste
a lot of time on “what if” but just carry on with whatever they have
left.

Alpha is definitely not feral. She rushes out when I enter the room
and rubs my ankles and purrs loudly when I pet her. I don’t know the
limits of her appetite for affection, because I always get tired of it
before she does. I am slowly working my way down her back. She is
sensitive to having her hind quarters touched. I think her tailless
state in not natural, and she may have undergone some trauma over
it. But I’m making progress.

She is adjusting to the dogs. Big Tagg just blunders up and sticks
her nose in and tries to lick Alpha. Subtlety is not one of Tagg’s
qualities. Alpha hisses and whaps Tagg’s nose with a combination
that would impress Sugar Ray, but withholds her claws…lucky for
Tagg. Charlie the pug is afraid of Alpha and stays a carefully
calculated distance from her reach. It is funny to watch their games.
Yesterday Tagg got a slurpy lick in before Alpha could retaliate.

Gus, the cat, is not making it easy for Alpha though. Cat’s ways are
strange. There is a territorial thing, and probably a pecking order
thing too. When Gus goes in the room, they both start moving in slow
motion, posturing and looking deformed and spastic, and making all
manner of yeowling and growling and hissing, and putting on a big
show.

The first trip into the room, Gus backed Alpha up into a corner and
got up on her hind legs and shadow boxed at her with fearsome
speed and agility, but never touched her. Then she sashayed out like
she was queen of the world.

Yesterday was much weirder. Gus crept into Alpha’s sand box, and
after thoroughly sniffing it out, she stood there in the middle of the
box and sprayed a rather large section of the carpet around it. Then
she sashayed out again, pausing in the doorway where she got out
her compact and refreshed her lipstick, or the cat version of that,
which is a little lick, lick, here, lick, lick there. She is such a bitch!

But Alpha has not succumbed, apparently, because later I found she
had taken a crap on the very spot Gus sprayed. You can probably
come up with what the cat words for what that gesture represented!

So the adjustment goes on. Who knows where it will lead. Both cats
are old (Gus is nearly fifteen), so maybe they never will accept each
other. I am more concerned with the matting right now. The vet
shaved the huge one off her rump, and the one under her neck, but
she has a couple dozen finger joint-sized ones all over. I notice she
has begun to groom herself, and I’ve started putting anti-hair ball
stuff on her paw, because she’s been throwing up on the rug. This
morning I found some matting on my desk, so she’s making progress.
I’ve never had a long-haired cat for just this reason, but her coat is
beautiful…if she ever gets it cleaned up. She does not like to be
brushed.

But I know she is settling in. The first week, I never saw her anything
but wide awake and hyper-alert. Yesterday she was asleep on my
desk, so deeply so that she didn’t wake up when I came in. I looked
back as I went out the door, and her head was still buried under her
paw. So glad to see her peaceful. Maybe I was right to save her that
day.

Re: rescue update

Re: rescue update

Re: rescue update

Re: rescue update