Loving Stray Cats, And Burying Them

THE CARTOON, drawn in stick figures, was quite explicit, the message clear. On the left was a fancy pet shop, with a fancy dog and a fancy cat in the window, quite content to be where they are, seemingly, but only seemingly, waiting to be sold at a price to the highest bidder. Pedigree Pets for sale.Taylor made and bred for the choosy American family. Future family members for sale. In front of the store stands a couple, window shopping. Next door, on the right, is an animal shelter, the window full of cats and dogs crammed together in cages, leaning towards the window, front legs spread apart, beckoning, begging for a home, leaning out for love. Nobody is looking back at them. I never had a reason to go inside either place, although I would gladly enter the animal shelter, and never will set foot inside the place of pets for profit, profiting from lives and souls being arguably immoral, arguably, worthy of criminalization. I needn't visit a shelter for unwanted dogs and cats. They come to me, uninvited, but welcome. The first one to enter my yard, Manidi still lives with me,and indoor cat, now twelve and a half years old. Her siblings, Jake and Shylow, too beautiful ad sweet to be unwanted, but unwanted, followed Mandi into my heart and home, but are gone now, of liver failure and multiple organ failure. Cats are very mortal, not only because of cars and people and predators, but for the same reasons that people are. Same psysiology,same vulnerabilities.Jake might have had cancer too,I was told, as I prepared to put his ashes in a place of honor above my fireplace. In my yard are buried several of my outdoor babies: Cassandra,Lucky, Mickey, who was only a tiny baby when he was struck and hit, possibly on purpose, by a speeding, oblivious but all too typical America. Then, also in my yard rests a yellow tabby who came to my very late in his tough but long life, a very old cat, full of worms and disease. Just before he died I named him "Welcome Buddy",and buried him with love and dignity. Three of my precious ones have been struck and killed by ars in the last twelve years, on the street where I live, a quiet residential neighborhood where children live, and the street is tiny narrow, with a speed limit of twenty. Every car that passes my house is going forty. I have tried to get the town to install a speed bump or two. Nobody seems to care. Incredible. The most recent victim of American arrogance and disregard for life was my beloved outdoor kitten (I call all cats"kittens") Amy, gorgeous pure white with ocean blue eyes that mesmerized, mother of four. I walked outside on a Friday at five in the afternoon, in late October, and there she was,dead in the street. The pattern of blood stains on the "wicked and expedient pavement" (Amy Lowell, "Patterns") indicated a few moments of painful struggle. When I got to her she was still warm, and her body had not yet begun to stiffen. That happens fast. She had been dead only moments. The car that killed her had just turned the corner. Nobody ever stops. Why should they? It isn't their baby. The frequent rain since her death has failed to wash away to blood stains. The painful reminder, it seems, is permanent. Amy's grave was disturbed, so I reburied her, and guarded her grave. I have five kittens buried in my front yard, (Cassandra, Lucky, Mickey, Welcome Buddy,and now Amy). I have three small boxes of ashes above my fireplace: Jake. Shylow, and Diamond. Stray cats are everywhere, and they show up, to live with me. Maybe I improve their lives, maybe not. I give them food and fresh water, veterinary care, an electric blanket in the winter, and love and atention. Whether the popular word "rescue" applies I have no idea. All I know is, I try. I would much rather there be no more cremations and burials, but where will be. My only hope is that in the future I only bury and cremate very old cats.