Jane Ganahl

After Judy put up fliers in the vicinity where Charlotte was trapped, a family came forward to claim her! They said she had been missing three weeks (about as long as she had been at the PHS and then at my house) and surmised that a neighbor had trapped her and taken her to the pound, without telling them. (Methinks they should move.) I was thrilled to see her go, though concerned that that the family needs to exercise a little more control over their pets and not let them wander unduly. (See what a cranky cat rescuer I’m becoming? Something I swore I’d never be. 😉

And then – wonder of wonders – Pokey got a home!! I have not even written too much about darling Pokey, who has been living here for 18 months now since I plucked him from the colony and had him neutered, thus ending a succession of litters of kittens in the area. When I learned he was FIV+, and also walked with a limp (the result, the vet said, of probably being hit by a car when he was young), I could not return him to the wild, and set about socializing the 7-year-old. It took a while, but he has been my bedroom companion for a year now – to the chagrin of the other kitties who are shut out – and has become a total love. A couple that is part of my extended family will take him into their gorgeous Russian Hill home in SF on Saturday, and I can promise you I shall cry buckets. He is like my own kitty now!

Meanwhile, Mickey Blue Eyes has ‘tamed up’ nicely – he didn’t have far to go to remember his manners! He is still skittish, but very adorable and very needy. I’m starting to look for his forever home as well, as no one has responded to the ads saying I’d found him. Not surprising; I imagine his owner gave up hope – he had been out there quite a long time, as the way-too-small collar would attest. He’ll make someone a darling, rambunctious pet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAProjj7Ouw&feature=youtu.be

Than seeing the look on Chiara’s face when she is making both kittens purr at once. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xT1zxuqgvho
I could watch that video a thousand times and never get tired of it. Or this one, in which Michael, Chiara’s three-year-old brother, also dotes on the kittens. As testament to how kittens/cats adapt to children (even ferals!!) look how quietly Charlotte sits as Michael tries to “make the fur be flat,” and rubs her the wrong way! 🙂 And how sweetly Chiara instructs him in what kitties like best. Crushes me. The same way these kittens opened my heart, so they are expanding the world of these gorgeous kids.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivzDYiPl6ck

Last year at this time, a little Russian Blue boy kitty came to me, meowing in the feeding area. Around 3 months old, he was a kitten of god-knows-whom, and I was in a pre-Litquake frenzy. I debated even trapping him; if I did, I’d be responsible and then I couldn’t go on my trip to Port Towsend! (Or so the howling voice of insecurity in my head told me.) But I went ahead and grabbed him, and when Litquake rolled around a few weeks later, I asked for help from my friend Cynthia, who’d always wanted a Russian Blue kitten. She took him in and named him Baudelaire, only to discover that her ancient kitty, Belle, was NOT happy about the addition. I was chagrined to hear this, but then divine intervention stepped in AGAIN, and her neighbor, Donna, took Baudelaire. They’ve had a lovely first year.

And now, this is happening again.  Yesterday I put some anchovies in a carrier, opened the door, and little lost boy walked right in. He was NOT happy once he got to my house, bolted from the cage in my spare bedroom, and began running around looking for an escape. But he finally settled down, and within hours was rolling around on the carpet, begging for food and affection. He has the most gorgeous eyes I’ve seen in a long time – apparently he’s got Blue Point Siamese in him – so for that reason I’ve named him Mickey.  (For the film Mickey Blue Eyes, which I loved.)

Today I whisked him to the vet, praying that he’d have a microchip, but no such luck. The vet, though, pronounced him relatively healthy, despite some parasites and scratches – just a bit thin and dehydrated. And he’s intact, meaning now he has to be neutered. Groan. And he’s a baby – just a year to 18 months. I plan to paper this neighborhood with flyers, asking if someone has lost a kitty? I hope he wasn’t abandoned with his pretty little collar around his neck, which could have easily choked him. I took it off as soon as he let me handle him – it was on too tight, and tattered, which makes me think he’s been lost a good long while.  🙁

Maybe he was a kitten when he got away or was left behind? I despair of my fellow humans sometimes, thinking someone might have moved away and left him in the ravine, thinking they were doing him a favor. But I won’t go there – I choose to think he was a beloved pet who somehow got away. And I’m lighting a candle that someone will see the flyer and be overjoyed that Mickey can come home again at last.

As if the powers that be couldn’t allow me to enjoy a moment of peace after my tearful farewell to Wilbur and Charlotte*, I got two new “assignments” right away. The first came in the form of a group email to all the cat rescuers on the coast: a beautiful black female kitty had been taken to the Peninsula Humane Society from the coast. Believing she was feral and unadoptable, they prepared to euthanize her when someone rescued her. The APB asked for someone to put her up for a little while and assess her. I raised my hand. The name she’d been given by her rescuer, interestingly enough, was Charlotte.

*Charlotte the kitten and Wilbur, her brother, after a rocky few days when they mostly hid, are starting to embrace their new family. Two nights ago, they climbed in bed with Janine’s little girl, and all fell asleep together. Yay!!

Anyway, it took me all of two days to realize Charlotte II was not feral – just terrified. When I used my fleece-covered backscratcher to caress her, she shrunk away at first, then slowly rolled her head to accept my affections, and relaxed. She’s now been in my garage for a week, and she lets me hold her, loves to be petted, and is generally going stir-crazy, as any of my indoor kitties would if stuck in a cage. Also, although she is very thin, her medium-long fur is gorgeous and silky, her eyes bright, her health perfect. This is someone’s housecat, people!!

Charlotte’s story is complicated by the fact that she was microchipped (shouldn’t that have been PHS’s first clue?) but the chip information was wrong. (They called a woman to say they’d found her lost pet, and she apparently replied that no, my cat is right here.) OY. I consulted with Suzan, my pet communicator, and she said she sensed a great bewilderment on Charlotte’s part. That she had been allowed to roam freely by her family, but came home one day and the house was locked, and they were gone. There’s no way to know for sure, but what Suzan said resonated deeply with me. I believe that Charlotte is a hard-luck case, who has never had a real heart connection with a human, and understandably fears the worst. I’ll keep her for a while longer, while we look to see if in fact she does have a family looking for her. (Her rescuer will put up flyers in the area in which she was trapped.) It really does take a village.

The same day that Charlotte came to me, a new kitty emerged from the bushes near where I put out food for Smokey the raccoon. An obvious BOY who has not been fixed, he meowed loudly (my first clue that he is also not feral) rolled in the dirt to get my attention, and ate so desperately I thought he would hyperventilate. And – proof poz that he was someone’s pet – he is sporting a tattered collar: white leather, with the remnants of glitter or some other fancy coloring. Chokes me up to think of some little girl who thought that was a good choice for a boy kitty, and loved him dearly only to have him slip out the door or window and wander away. (That’s a less distressing fantasy than a bankrupt family abandoning him, as perhaps happened with Charlotte.)

I’ve been calling him Rufus this first week, as I bring him his food. At first he loved the food more than anything; now, he pauses in his feasting to rub against my legs, and purrs when I pet him. How did you end up here, sweet boy?

Because his eyes are a beautiful turquoise blue, he might have a bit of Siamese in him (or be so malnourished that his eyes are impacted – yes this happens) and he is blond with bits of tabby-brown. Very interesting-looking, pretty little guy. I’ve been putting the trap by him the last two days, to get him used to it, but he’s so friendly I might be able to spare him the trauma and violence of the trap by putting his food inside a carrier and closing the door. It has to be done, but when I do… then I’ll have TWO CATS who need homes!! And Litquake is starting in two weeks, and my long-awaited vacation, in three. It’s anxiety-inducing, but I have to trust that it will be okay – that I’ll get help when I need it.

St. Francis, happy to do your work, but please give me a hand in it!

Pokey has forgiven me for taking his ‘kids’ away.

On Tuesday I bundled them up and drove them to their new home in the East Bay. After I got home to see the kitten-rearranged room, full of toys and knocked over books, but sooooo very quiet, and lacking in baby energy, I cried. And Pokey stayed under the bed, looking peeved and miserable. Later, he came out from under the bed and meowed plaintively. I cried again.

(Having never been a cryer, this new phase of my life – the one in which my heart is cracked open on an almost daily basis, to welcome a flood of both joy and sadness – is challenging to me.)

He finally let me cuddle him after a couple of days of confused standoffishness. 

But Charlotte and Wilbur are the ones I worry about. Now in a strange home and without their ‘nanny’ Pokey, I can sense their anxiousness all the way from Oakland. I get daily updates from the wonderful Janine, who is being an excellent kitten-mom, being patient and kind with them as they adapt, but I still miss them and light a candle daily that they relax and become cuddlers quickly, and bring as much joy into Janine’s life as they did in mine.

I treasured the seven weeks I had them. Watching them morph from hissing, angry little beasts with parasites and fleas, to the beautiful, sweet kittens they became. The pleasure of Wilbur’s exquisite Russian Blue fur – almost like chinchilla in its softness and density – and his floppy silliness, how he would struggle for a second in my arms, almost like a little boy who pretends he doesn’t want to be cuddled, only to melt into grateful acceptance. And Charlotte, the bolder but oddly more aloof sibling, who nonetheless adored it when I would lie with her on the bed, petting her sleeping form until her motor revved and her purr would kick in. She would stretch languidly and look up at me with blinking eyes, reaching a paw to my cheek as if to ask why I had stopped. If he is a goofy, gentle Shrek, she is the peppery Fiona. (I think it’s magic that I chose their names from a children’s book, before knowing they were going to a family with children.)

Even as I write this, the lump in the throat starts. Time to stop – I have more work to do. Almost magically, as soon as the kittens were gone, I was tapped by St. Francis to intervene in the lives of two new kitties – both of whom I believe were house pets – who have come into my sphere needing urgent help. I’ll write about that more next time.

Meanwhile, I am thrilled that Charlotte and Wilbur have found a wonderful home, but wondering if saying goodbye ever gets easier.

I generally wait a while until kitties start to display personalities before I stick them with permanent names, and this time is no different. I’d called my gray and white baby girl Frankie, and the gray boy Mischa. But these names are both too butch and too fancy for the kitties they’ve become in these four weeks of indoor living. So they are now Charlotte for the uber-girlie and prissy wee female, and Wilbur for the hilariously laid-back, aw-shucks little boy charmer. They’ve pretty much lost all their fear, as evidence by these photos of them completely unconscious in sleep.

I’m hopefully going to take them in for spay and neuter next week, and then continue the full court press for a new home – hopefully together. As happens this time of year, everything dates back from Litquake, which begins Oct. 11. I leave two days after it’s done on the 19th, for two weeks in the Northwest, and would love for them to be happily ensconced before then. And these things can sometimes take a while.

In the meanwhile they continue to socialize and grow into utter sweet peas. Charlotte is still a bit standoffish – anxious when she is held, but loves to be petted on the ground, and Wilbur is a total glutton for love, and a hilarious little clown.

The extraordinary thing is that when I was away this last weekend, they busted through their confinement in my bathroom and began hanging out with Pokey, their grandpa, who is confined in my larger bedroom. When my petsitter, Kim, told me this, I freaked. Pokey is FIV+ and very territorial. I feared he would hurt them and could do permanent damage with a bite. But she assured me that it was instant, besotted love between the three of them, and every time she looked under the bed, they were in a big pile of furry cuddles.

When I got home, I was astounded. Pokey came out to greet me, followed by the two wee ones, who rubbed against him frantically. And for his part, he seemed absolutely overjoyed to  have friends. He now lies on his (big fat) side, while they romp and sleep on him, chewing on his ears and swatting at his tail, and he is just as sweet as he can be.

.

Does he know that they’re his offspring?? That Mama Grace is his daughter and therefore he’s their gramps? It’s hard to know, but surely he must detect a hint of common DNA? How else to explain his rather amazing conversion?

It’s been less than a week, but I’m already worrying about taking them away from Pokey when they are adopted. I’ve never seen him happier in the 18 months since I rescued him. Francis, I could use some guidance on this one. Meanwhile, I’m luxuriating in kitten adorableness. I’m trying to drink it in, as they’ll be gone all too soon.

There’s a woman who walks her dog near the old Odwalla building – where I put food out for Smokey the raccoon, and her kitty friend who lives behind the Post Office. (I only see Smokey once a week or so, but I can tell when she’s been there, as someone has been washing their dirty paws in the water bowl.)

She has watched me numerous times when our paths cross, and last time I saw her, she exclaimed, “you must be the nicest person in the world!” I was genuinely flummoxed. “Not at all,” I stammered. “I just see a need and fill it.” She shook her head, having none of it. “I think someone should give you an award,” she smiled.

If that ever happens, it won’t be for niceness, I can guaran-damn-tee you. As I get older, and more involved with these activities, my heart continues to open, and I continue to grow in sensitivity. And where that should probably translate to more kindness toward my fellow humans, it’s not always so. In fact, more often I’m a total crank. Especially when critters are involved.

A week ago at an afternoon Litquake event, I saw an elderly dog who was tied up for more than two hours while its caretaker went to readings. It was hot outside, so someone had given it some water. And wonderful, sensitive Darothy even took it for a walk. But by the time its owner got back, I was loaded for bear. “I was ready to call the SPCA,” I told the young woman. “Not very nice to an old dog to leave it tied up for hours.” She was utterly taken aback and after stammering reasons why the dog was actually fine, she left the scene.

Then a few days later, my neighbor emailed, asking me for help in thinking of ways to re-train an elderly kitty who had begun peeing in the wrong places. She said her husband wanted to take him to a shelter, and I snapped. “You take him to a shelter, you kill him,” I wrote tersely, and then recommended a course of action that involved confining him in a bathroom etc. She thanked me, but I reproached myself later, thinking I was acting judgmental and imperious… again.

Does standing up for critters vociferously make me an unpleasant harpy? Since this seems to be a path that has chosen me, should I listen to those authentic impulses? I’ve met activists in my life who are so impassioned about their causes that no one wants to sit next to them at dinner. I can’t imagine that happening, but if it does, aren’t there worse things in life? I’d much rather be accused of excess passion than be voiceless and passive.

My friend Karen sent me some words tonight by Audre Lord, the great civil rights activist and author, that resonated enormously.

“Your silences will not protect you…. What are the words you do not yet have? What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day and attempt to make your own, until you will sicken and die of them, still in silence? We have been socialized to respect fear more than our own need for language. Next time, ask: What’s the worst that will happen? Then push yourself a little further than you dare. Once you start to speak, people will yell at you. They will interrupt you, put you down and suggest it’s personal. And the world won’t end. And the speaking will get easier and easier. And at last you’ll know with surpassing certainty that only one thing is more frightening than speaking your truth. And that is not speaking.”

So I can’t apologize. I can only hope to learn the language of impact – what will make people listen rather than turn away. It would be grand to be both nice and impactful, but I had to choose between the two, there’s no real choosing to do.

The kittens have traded personalities now. Mischa is now more outgoing, while Frankie remains steadfastly peevish and reticent. I moved them from the garage to a small watercloset upstairs, which has a high window for some natural light. They will outgrow it in days, but it’s a good first spot for them in the quest to get them used to the sights and sounds of the indoor life. So I turn on the TV in the outer room, and know they’re going to be freaked all over again for a few days.

Except that on that first day, when I took Mischa on my lap for a cuddle, he settled down immediately, closed his copper eyes… and began to purr. It felt like a tiny miracle, given that less than two weeks ago, he was bashing around the cage I trapped him in, and I feared he would die of terror. I was starving for dinner, but could not bear to move for around 20 minutes – perhaps irrationally fearful that it would be the only time he would do it.  When I put him back down on the blanket with Frankie, she stared at him. What the hell is that noise you’re making? Are you possessed?

I needn’t have worried it was a one-time thing – even after an ordeal like the one they had yesterday. I had decided to ask the mobile vet to come and check them out for general health, test for FIV, and deworm them (almost all ferals come with parasites – the hazard of eating food off the ground). They were stunningly “good” – both Dr. MacInnes and her assistant marveled at how quietly they sat during examination, and didn’t fuss when they had to draw blood from their upturned necks. (I had to look away – I could never watch Erin getting an injection as a baby, and then would cry when she cried.)

Examination done, pronounced FIV negative and surprisingly healthy minus the giveaway “Buddha belly” that indicates parasites, the kittens retreated into a traumatized huddle in their little house-box. I left them there to recover a few hours, and when I returned in the twilight hour, I could only see their outlines in the dark of the box. I reached in and felt Mischa’s sweet back, and petted him blindly. And it was almost immediate: prrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

The resilience of critters, to adapt and to bend and to open themselves to love, never fails to astound.

Now the tough part: choosing the right time to get them spayed and neutered (Dr. Mac won’t do it this young, but everyone else will) and then finding them a home. I am committed to them being adopted together, unless the circumstances are perfect for them to go separately. (i.e. another cat to welcome them solo.) Even as I write this I feel the tear ducts activate. Can one really fall in love with a critter in two weeks? Apparently so.

Relief, joy, wonder. Mama returned to the scene of the crime yesterday after five days’ absence. Sitting on the sidewalk with her pal, my former trappee Diego, she stared at me as if to say, what were you so anxious about? Did you not know I’d come back? I was so tremblingly glad to see her I thought I might lunge at her for a hug, which would have sent her scrambling for another week’s walkabout. So I refrained, but I gave her some good tuna (at least better than the usual cheap swill I can afford) in gratitude that she returned. She ate quietly and leisurely, and went on her way. She was also back this morning.

And then today: a Smokey sighting! Despite a lack of appearances, I have continued to put out food for her every morning, which is mostly eaten by this pretty tortoise shell girl in the photo (trapped and neutered by the Odwalla folks) and Diego, who seems to cover a lot of ground in the interest in stuffing his sweet face. I am so amazed and moved by Smokey – how she is able to navigate the area, with only a bit of sight. I keep thinking it would so nice to trap her and move her to a sanctuary, but she clearly is not suffering unduly, and with sightings only every several weeks, it’s not a recipe for an easy catch.

And in my garage, new baby steps (kitten steps?) by Frankie and Mischa. After ten days in captivity, they are coming around so sweetly. They still get anxious when they see me, but there is no longer any hissing unless I surprise them. Every day I go down to the garage every few hours to get my “kitten fix,” and scoop them up into my arms for a few blissful minutes – a little longer each time. (I always put them down if they start to struggle – I don’t want them to equate being held with stress.) They are soft as bunnies and don’t object to my kissing the tops of their wee heads. Frankie remains the butchier of the two; Mischa is a little shy boy, much easier to hold. This photo hilariously tells it all – with Mischa hiding behind his sister. His expression: don’t kill me! Her’s: don’t f— with me.  😉

This morning’s biggest development was that Frankie meowed! Maybe for the first time in her life, a little bird-like chirp erupted when I first arrived with their breakfast that seemed to shock her a bit. (As I mentioned previously, feral cats almost never meow until they become completely adapted to the world of humans. You make noise in the wild, you become something’s dinner.)

I am anxious to get them checked out by a vet (there is some FIV in that feral tribe, tho never yet among kittens) so I can start the search for the perfect home(s). I’ve left a message for the coastal mobile vet, and hope she can come early next week. Then it’s off to the spay/neuter, and then to some lucky adopter(s) once they’ve recovered. And already my heart breaks, thinking of that parting. Again, I am too “soft” and open-hearted for this work, really and truly. But even though my heart’s been broken about a dozen times in the last almost three years, it’s when I coax those first purrs out of a feral cat that I know it’s worth it – that I know I’m doing the right work.

Here’s hoping for those purrs sooner than later.

After three days of being completely freaked, the kittens finally settled down a bit on day four – enough to eat baby food off my fingers, and let me touch them lightly (recoiling throughout). I asked Caitlin, ace cat rescuer with http://humanimalconnection.com, to come and check them out. They seemed healthy but I was curious to know their sex, since it was getting tiresome to call them androgynous names. And it looked like it would be a while before I was able to get them “fixed” – the wonderful vet in town who gives me a price break on surgeries said they needed to be at least four months old, and I estimated these babies to be at maybe 8 weeks.

Caitlin confirmed my suspicions, and proclaimed them 8 or 9 weeks old. She also put them through the indignity of a genital inspection – the first time either of them had been held – and said Baby Blue was definitely a boy, and Frankie was almost certainly a girl. Interesting, as Frankie has emerged the unquestioning alpha in their tiny pack – hissing avidly (tho it’s more like a “hey how’s it going” hiss than a “I would tear your eyes out if I were bigger” hiss), and grey baby has spent most of his time hiding behind her in the carrier. She said they both seem thin, tho healthy enough, and suggested another vet on the Peninsula who would take them younger than four months so I can get about finding them home(s). (I’m praying someone takes them together.)

I have some leads already, which is amazing. And I’ve decided to start calling my beautiful little Russian blue boy Mischa, after my favorite Russian ballet dancer, Mikhail Baryshnikov. Today they are letting me hold them, if reluctantly, and my heart is full with gratitude for how well this is gone so far.

All but one thing: Mama Grace. I was anxious to see her the day after I trapped her babies, and amazingly – and for the first time after seeing another cat trapped by the ravine – she was there. She usually vanishes for a few days to even a week, leaving me to feel guilty to have busted up her cat-family yet again. But this time she was there. I could see her below in the bushes, looking up at me with big eyes that didn’t show much fear. I called to her. Still holding my gaze, she blinked once. (What ferals do to show recognition and trust.) And then twice. Then she turned tail and disappeared. And I haven’t seen her since.

Gracie is among the world’s most independent of creatures. I’ve thought more than once that she must have been killed, because she would be gone for so many days, only to have her show up like nothing had happened. So I have faith that she is not gone for good, but because she feels like my cat now – no, she is my cat, just one that has never let me touch her – I miss her and worry when she’s gone. And I also pray that she does truly understand why I do what I do. I don’t break up her family because it’s fun, but to prevent more suffering.

Her blinking was a small wonder. It almost felt like she came to give me atonement, before going on a kitten-free walkabout. (Thanks for the babysitting! I’m outta here!) As one friend noted, she might have been relieved that I did what I did. Defending kittens from predators is a full-time job – one that caused her a wound in her neck about a month ago. So maybe she’s feeling grateful, rather than bereft, that her kittens are in my arms now. I can only hope and trust.