Ex to the Rescue

On days like today it all makes sense doing what I'm doing.

Last week I got a call from a woman at a counseling center in the area. A client of theirs was probably going to jail for some unspecified infraction of the law and had a cat with nowhere to go. She had no family or friends who would take the cat. She was planning either to leave him behind in the house or possibly take him in to be put down. Not again!

When I went to the house we chased the cat all around a cluttered porch with a burned-out light in the semi-darkness. Fluffy was a beautiful 6-year-old long-haired gray beauty with no claws, but the strength and size of two cats and a pissed-off demeaner. I realized he was not going to be easy to find a home for. And he hated other cats.

At my house in a room by himself he hissed and whacked the carrier door so violently that I waited awhile to open it. When I finally did he spit and lunged and tried to bite me. For the next couple of days he growled whenever I went into the room to feed him. Strangely, he was not so aggressive when my husband went in to scoop his box. In a couple more days he merely grumbled and waited for me to leave the room before he went for his meals or treats. By the seventh day he let me get close enough to let him sniff my finger before he growled.

Then the woman from the counseling center called again and said she had, through a series of unlikely events, come across the ex-boyfriend of the cat's owner. He had been there when Fluffy was a kitten and tried to take the cat when he left the relationship, but the woman had refused. He really wanted the cat back!

This morning I gave Fluffy back to a very happy man who cried when he saw him and thanked me over and over. Fluffy sniffed his fingers through the carrier door and seemed content. I loaded the guy up with a litter box, food, collar, current medical records, and counted myself extremely lucky!

I was so afraid I was going to get stuck with a very difficult cat, but by a small miracle Fluffy ended up in the most perfect place possible! Why hadn't the woman contact her ex about taking Fluffy? It semed like a no-brainer.

We all know it was probably all about pride and control. I'm sure lots of people would rather put an animal they have loved to sleep rather than call on someone from an uncomfortable past to ask for help or admit failure or need. But it's just not acceptable in my book to kill or abandon an animal for such selfish reasons. It's a life!

Everyone involved in this rescue mission is very happy with the outcome. I wondeer how many other ex-boyfriends, -girlfriends, -spouses, -friends, -co-workers could be called upon to step up when an animal has "nowhere to go".

Anyway, sometimes it just works out.