There’s a look that comes about the face when all hope is lost. Eyes become hollow, unfocused. The soul surrenders but the spirit is fearful. It’s a deadpan look, though a body cannot lie. Muscles clench and relax instinctively. There is fight and there is flight, but it takes a while to decide. One is harder. Both may be final. I am excellent at vibe checking. New age woo woo folks would consider me an empath. Sometimes, I go overboard, titling feelings that, while always accurate, may be mild and subconscious. In other words, I blow things out of proportion. That was the feeling I got when I ran into her in an office, my husband’s office, to be exact. She was looking out the window, though not really. She was pretending to look out the window, pretending not to notice me. But, she knew. In retrospect, it may have seemed like I cornered her. I spoke in a monotone voice, neither fast nor slow, not happy, not sad. I find that sort of impartialness to be highly effective in circumstances of despair. When I entered her personal space, all of my hopes were dashed. She went for me. I have the scars to prove it. She attacked, as only a red tabby cat trapped in the corner can do. Yep, it is time for a cat update. Welcome to feral spay and neuter day.
There are two main organizations in the greater Dallas area that handle feral cat sterilizations, or so it seems. They have multiple locations, but it all boils down to these places. The rules are identical. Trap a cat. Bring said cat(s) to a location that opens at 7 am but show up at 6 am to line up outside. Pray that the daily limit of feral intakes is not met before they get to you. Period. It is hard to trap cats. It takes tuna and live traps and patience, if you’re ever successful at all. Cats are beings of superior knowledge housed in bodies of tiny ninjas; their throwing star claws always ready to maim. “Tuna in a cage? Nice try, Dina. I’ll just be heading to Susan’s house on the next block.” If the trap goes according to plan, however, you only have a single day to complete the mission, a sterilized cat that can still eat on all the neighborhood porches but can no longer contribute to the feral cat overpopulation issue. Showing up only to be turned away, especially after waiting in icy, cold rain, is absolutely demoralizing. You start to understand why people don’t even try. That’s been me, here in downtown Forney, for a few years: Dina the Demoralized. Yet, I promised to do right by this last feral litter. We rescued four kittens in the summer. We could not catch the remaining two, until the temps dipped, and the snow fell, that is. I shall rename myself. I am now Dina the Down but Not Out.
I blame my husband, partially because it’s easier and mainly because it’s true! One moment he was admiring the falling snow. The next minute he was standing in the foyer with a 6-month-old red male cat, holding him like Rafiki held up Simba in The Lion King. “What should I do with General Grievous? He’s so cold.” That is how we wound up with the two remaining feral-ish cats of that litter, The General (for short - never let 5-year-olds name animals) & Bootsie, in his office. Granted, we have worked very hard over the last 5 months, trying desperately to socialize them in case this dream ever came to fruition. This would later work against me. Both of the aforementioned organ izations explained they were no longer true ferals. As “community cats” they would not be eligible for the discounted feral program. Alas. That is how I found myself near tears most days, spending the hours between 1:30 pm and 3 pm on hold, often mysteriously cycled into the land of terminated calls, pleading with people to help me help these cats. That brings me to this morning and my tussle with a feisty red-headed broad. Bootsie will rue the day she challenged me, however. My mother was a feisty redhead, after all.
“Honey, we have to leave in 15 minutes. I need help getting the office cats into pet carriers.” I voluntold my husband into the role of assistant trapper. His temperament went from less than excited to bothered to extreme rage, very quickly. The solution, it turns out, was to pay full price, schedule appointments, and deliver them to the surgical center in carriers as pets. Still, the promise of an eventual cat-free office was an apt lure. The General marched into his carrier like a good soldier. One light tap on the derrière and he was expertly detained for our drive. After all, my cat taming granddaughter has spent all her free hours giving snuggles and pets to these cats for over a week. We can pet them. We can hold them. They love us or so we thought. Bootsie decided she was not going easily into that good night. Thrice she erupted from the cat carrier like Bruce Lee chopping through concrete. Ouch - she got my hand. Bam - a scratch from elbow to wrist appeared on my husband’s arm. Argh - I see a puncture wound in the heel of my left hand and feel a sharp pain on my bicep. She’s in the corner. No, wait, she’s on the windowsill. Egad, she’s behind the bookcase. Miraculously, two clumsy adults, still half asleep, wrestled live barbed wire into a small cage.
We lined up outside the facility, right behind the feral cat handlers, there for an hour already, blankets over their live traps, a cacophony of cat songs filling the misty morning air. I don’t know if I will find homes for these two. They really are so very sweet and loving, but no longer adorable kittens. I do know they have a forever seat at my porch diner with no worries of contributing to the massive feral issue in this bucolic hamlet. In the end, that’s a v for victory, my friends.
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