I really like cats. I have been without them for several years now. Apartment living just did not seem to support having cats. So when the relationship with my significant other ended we agreed she would keep them. They would have lost their minds in the small apartment I moved into after being used to a two story house and getting outside regularly. The cats were indoor/ supervised outdoor cats. That means when I was in charge of them they came outside with me and I kept my eyes on them. For you Audubon enthusiasts not once did they catch a bird. They caught plenty of mice, chipmunks and an occasional small rabbit, but they did not wander the world creating havoc, at least not on my watch.
Eventually one died of kidney disease and the other disappeared. Apparently, without my knowledge, he was regularly being left outside all day long to wander about. In the process of moving out of the house each Wednesday evening I would come to the house to remove some more of my possessions and also play with the cats. It was the beginning of October and I arrived at the house at 3 p.m. But on what would become my final visit there was only one cat present. I felt my heart sink. Even writing about it 3 years later brings tears to my eyes. My “Ex” was away for an extended period but “house sitters” were supposed to be caring for them. So I wandered the property, 21 rural acres, calling out for him. I continued my search till 10 p.m. then sat down inside with the indoor and outdoor lights on and the door open hoping desperately that he would show but knowing in my heart he was gone.
Then the door opened and in stepped…not the cat…but the “house sitter”, who was also the boyfriend. Surprise! This was something I was not informed of. He asked what I was doing there. I thought, the house is still in my possession dummy, but stated I was waiting for Mischief. He then stated that “the cat” had been gone for three days and I quote, “he was a pretty good cat, someone probably should have told you.” I got up out of the chair, calmly walked to the door, got in the car, and slowly drove out the long driveway. It was only when I got to the road that the tears started. There have been moments in my life when I considered doing harm to another person, nothing murderous just a punch in the nose, and this encounter was at the top of the list. I am fortunate to have been working on mindfulness and compassion for years. It helped me to restrain myself from doing harm verbally and escalating an already bad situation. Vengeance would not change anything and only lead to further problems. But to have such indifference about the life of a cat so dear to me enraged me. Damn it! He was not just a cat, he was a living thing. I figured Mischief either got fed up and went for a “walkabout” and is now living with people who care for him appropriately or was eaten by coyotes. But I will never know. And I never received an explanation from my “Ex” who arrived back from her trip several days later. She probably did not get the truth from the “housesitter”, or maybe she did. I figure the cat was purposely neglected in the hope he would “get lost” as he was a reminder of me. I have no closure on this one. Disappearances leave so much unresolved.
Mischief was the name of the most amazing cat ever. I developed a bond with him that cannot be explained. We were just a perfect match. His name fit him. Once I was doing roof work with the extension ladder leaning against the house. It was a two-story saltbox so it was pretty tall. I had come down off of the roof and heard meowing that I could not quite hone in on. Mischief was very vocal. It almost sounded like it was coming from the sky. I looked up and Mischief was walking along the ridge vent of the house. I was confused to say the least. Well, there was only one possibility, he had climbed the ladder. After he spent some time exploring the house and garage roof he came down the ladder. For the next few hours I watched him walk up and down the ladder as I worked. He would come up the ladder, get off on the porch roof, and leap up onto the house roof.
When my “Ex” sometimes locked him in the bathroom because he was, well, being Mischief. He would escape almost instantaneously. I never actually saw his Houdini act but somehow he was following the toilet drain line, cut through the ceiling, and getting out through the upstairs bathroom. I can’t imagine how he squeezed through. If there was trouble to get into he would find it. He was the most friendly, good natured cat ever which is why he would not have lasted long on his own in the wild. He needed to be supervised. After he disappeared I would stop at cat adoption stores and shelters hoping he would have been picked up. A couple of times I thought, “it’s him!”, but it was only one that bore a resemblance. Initially we had adopted him from a pet store. I know he is gone but thinking about him still causes me to become upset. I wish he was still here. This is one of those pains that never fully goes away, you just learn to live with it.
So why this story today? Well my girlfriend and I adopted two kittens, at her urging, a week ago. They are beautiful. And the apartment they are living in is better than the cages at the pet store or premature death on the streets. I have accepted the fact that they will not be going outdoors. I have also gotten past the feeling that I am somehow betraying Mischief by adopting them. The adoption has brought back a lot for me. The two kittens came from a shelter in another state where they were going to be sentenced to death if someone did not take them. This is a fate that many suffer but fortunately is declining as our culture starts to embrace the concept of animal rights. A disturbing reality that confronts us is that we regularly make choices regarding who or what is disposable. Sometimes this means making a conscious choice to end the life of other living creatures with a less than ethical justification. I would even say frivolously.
So my question is what gives us this right to determine who or what is disposable? It requires supreme arrogance to judge others as less than us and sentence them to death. This is nothing new for humans. We have been killing and justifying it for millennia. I suggest another perception: we have a moral obligation, even duty, to stand up for those who cannot stand up for themselves, or are unable to, rather than exploit them. “Those” can be any living creature not just people. “Euthanizing”, a term that makes killing seem more acceptable, millions of cats, dogs, or other creatures is a poor attempt at a solution. Who would participate in such a thing? Choosing to perceive living creatures as a numbers? When the shelter is full some have to die? It is a frightening realization that it is so simple for us to dispose of living creatures because they have become a burden, economic or otherwise.
That being said my actions are often not consistent with my words. I have outed myself numerous times in the past as a less than perfect human who has a lot of improvements to make. I have used a personal example today about a cat I feel deeply for. But what about your cat? Or the one on the street who is struggling? In the past I have stated I am selectively compassionate but working on progressing. My conclusion is that the majority of us, how can I say this…we suck (if you struggle with too much guilt, depression, or take too much responsibility for others ignore the last statement). But admitting this reality frees us. It gives us a chance to realistically evaluate ourselves and collectively make efforts to improve. A collective “We Suck Movement”, done with a sense of humor, could go a long way in helping us mitigate the negative effects of our giant egos and motivate us to work together to improve the lives of all of us, cats and dogs included. We could call our affliction “We Suck Syndrome”. Like “Intermittent A-Hole Disorder” it can be cured with proper diagnosis and treatment. But we will have to do it together because many of us don’t know “we suck” and will need support to confront our denial so we can become sane. “Are you calling me insane” you might ask? Well…yes. What else would you call people who execute cats because there are too many of them or people because we don’t think they deserve to be treated with the same dignity and respect that all of us are entitled to (see the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights and then structural violence). I will leave you with this perspective to consider:
“A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”