“Adopting a cat is a crapshoot,” my friend told me, “especially shelter cats.”
This may be true, but over the years I’ve had very good luck with cats. Walter I adopted from the SPCA. He ran away after many happy, healthy years. Ethel was adopted as a kitten from a friend at work. She lived to be eighteen years old, with just one major operation. TicTac was an adoptee from the Berkeley Humane Society, and although she never adapted to anyone but me, lived past fifteen and was a very dear friend.
When TicTac passed on a few weeks ago, I went to Martinez Animal Services (aka the pound) and adopted Smidge (pictured below). She is small, loving, playful, and loves David and me, both. She is friendly to strangers and accepts petting, especially head skritches, and even occasional belly rubs, with joy.
Unfortunately, and tragically, Smidge became very ill less than two weeks after we adopted her. Her face swelled up, and discharge, then blood, came from her eye. At the emergency room, the vet said it was likely a fungal infection or cancer, and it would cost $4,000 in diagnostic services to find out which. We had to surrender Smidge back to animal services. I sat sobbing with her in the receiving area, my heart broken.
As I went through the rooms to find another cat to adopt in her place, I discovered Smidge, returned, forlorn, to her cage. After two weeks, I love her, but I can’t afford her care. My heart broke again.
I came home with BeBop, a tiger-stripe mix (pictured above the title), who hid under the bed but eventually came out for lap petting. She is a beautiful, slim, big-eared, big-eyed wonder. I named her BeBop thinking of the Cowboy BeBop song about a tiger-striped cat who has a million lives.
Yes, adopting a cat is a crap shoot, and it may well wreck your heart, but I am glad I did.