Mudpie

Ahhh, little Mudpie.  This little girl came to me from my parents.  Here I was the mother of 3 cats, doing the fostering and my parents called me to ask for my expertise and help with one of their cats.  Trust me I was not an expert at this time but only learning about the proper caring for these wonderful animals.  Apparently Mudpie has a scuffle with another cat and had a rather large wound in her back that had become infected filling with (ugh) puss.  

 

The call came in just before Thanksgiving so I went to their house to retrieve her and take care of her.  That was a challenge to say the least.  My parents had recently adopted a new Golden Retriever sometime after their first Golden had died of cancer and much to their cats dismay the puppy drove them crazy.  Hence Mudpie had taken to living in the rafters of my father’s garage and peeing in the garage around his antique cars.  So in order to get her I had to climb on top of the cloth’s washer then climb up into the rafters.  The climbing was the easy part, convincing her to come to me and then bring her down was a completely different task.

I brought her home, tended to her wound which one time was a very ugly deal.  Every evening I put her between my legs and had to massage the wound to remove the puss and then put Neosporin on it – YUCK.  Then one time while doing this it shot up onto my face, you’ve never seen anyone run so fast into the bathroom to wash off my face.  Mudpie though surprised me every time by purring the entire time I treated her. 

Just after Christmas, her wound healed, I told my parents she was ready to come home.  My father had a different idea.  Although he loved her he did not like her using his garage as a kitty litter box and worst of all he himself was dying of cancer.  I could not refuse his request that I let Mudpie come live with us. 

I don’t really know how long she lived but I think it was around 18 years.  After I bought my house every night when I came home from work she would be by the front door waiting for me.  And I called her my squirmy wormy since she would roll around when I reached down to pet her.      

Gorgeous George

He truly was gorgeous.  And he was a foster cat and feral cat.  He came to me in the early days of fostering cats and he was the first feral I had taken in.  The woman who introduced me to fostering had only been new at the cat rescue program herself and didn’t know much about the life of a feral cat.  Of course, I knew nothing. 

George went to adoptions every weekend and came back every weekend.  As time passed Sally told me that he would probably not get adopted since he was so anti-social with humans and they would have to put him back into one of the many feral communities in the South Bay area.  Oh, that did not sit well with me.  Although I knew there are hundreds of cats living in these communities I also knew their life span was much shorter than a domestic cat, not to mention he had now experienced the warmth of our home.  So I adopted him, now my 3^rd cat, along with the many fosters in the home.

As a feral cat George taught me about the personality of feral cats.  And I learned that unfortunately it is a very challenging prospect to adopt one.  I was told by the adoption women that based on the generation of the cat, how many generations of feral, they become very wary of humans and really only bond with other cats.  That is what I experienced with him.  

He spent most if not all his time either hiding or bonding with my other cats.  And although I truly loved him it was heart breaking that he was so reserved with me, coiling from affection.  He is deceased now but I will always love him and remember him.    

 

Sierra

My first puppy!!!  Well, as I wrote I grew up having dogs in our family but Sierra was the first dog of my own. 

 

I moved into my house and literally one week later, without having unpacked anything yet, was Mother’s Day.  My mother, youngest sister and I went to my other younger sister’s house in the high desert on this Mother’s Day.  My entire family had been urging me to get a dog, I just wanted to find time to unpack and make a home.  While at my sisters her neighbor just happened to come over, bringing 3 puppies from a recent litter.  As they walked across the yard with these little ones I knew I was being set up.

Sierra came right over to me, jumped onto my lap, put her front paws on my shoulders, looked me right in the eye and I fell in love.  That moment will be in my memories forever; I knew she was meant to be in my life. 

My younger sister, Katherine, also picked a puppy and as we all drove home that afternoon Katherine named her dog Sienna and by the time we got home I named my little girl Sierra.  While driving she was sitting in my lap, then I saw the size of her paws and I knew she would be a BIG dog, hence the Sierra Mountains came to mind.  In addition, I was told that these puppies were a mix of Rottweiler and Wolf, both very large animals. 

Over the coming couple months it was quite a challenge to train and be responsible for such a young one, so filled with energy and mischief.  One particular afternoon while out back in the yard Sierra was following me as she did all the time but I had finally had enough of her nipping at my calves.  By this time it not only was irritating but for days my calves were black and blue.  She never broke skin, it was done in play but I knew I needed to get control of the situation now because she was going to be bigger than me.  Yep I called a local park that offered “Puppy Training Classes”.

My “Little” girl turned out to be one of the best, although we had our challenges.  We didn’t make it through to the end of the classes, she was just like me and preferred to learn in the school of hard knocks.  Still I continued training her extensively on my own, learning as we went along.  She was also extremely close to my heart since I was to later find out she had epilepsy.  More stories to come on her health condition, an incredible learning experience. 

I have decided to introduce all of the domestic and yes, many wild animals in my life initially in my blog.  Then I will post the many stories about them, the health issues and so much more.

Jessie

Ahhh, little Jessie.  As mentioned, after I adopted Serenity and Heyokah I also became a foster mom to rescued cats and kittens for a volunteer organization.  My home became a revolving door of new cats.  It started off with just one or two but soon grew to several at a time.  Some cats lived in my home for only a few days while others lasted much longer.  Spring is Kitten season and that is when the big push began to find homes for all the cats.

In October 1994 as the adoption season was winding down my apartment manager was on vacation which meant that I was not only taking care of the fosters in my home but also the multitude of fosters in her home as well as her many cats.  Although I preferred to do fostering only, not participating in the Saturday and Sunday adoptions, while they were gone the other women from the organization would come to pick up all the foster cats.  That Sunday one of them showed up with a cat box carrier with a screaming cat, the box wiggling frantically.  She told me this wild one was previously adopted out and had been returned.  She was out of control and I really didn’t know what I was going to do with her.

I put her in my bathroom, keeping her in there overnight so as to keep some peace in my home.  The next day, after returning home from work, I went into the bathroom to see her and to assess the situation.  Oh my gosh, she shrunk against the bathtub, hissing and spitting at me, as I tried to calm her she would rush at me, claws out, hissing.  It wasn’t good. 

As the evening grew late she wouldn’t let up on the howling and since I was living in an apartment I let her out of the bathroom, praying she wouldn’t attack the other many cats in the home.  Thank goodness she blended in just fine.  Lesson learned she was fine with her own species.  It was time for me to give her a name…..Jessie.  Ok, now that you see her I’m sure you are thinking “That is the wild cat?”

Over the next six months she went to the adoptions every weekend and returned every weekend.  I was told that she wasn’t making a good impression because while sitting in the cages all she would do is suck on her own belly.  WHAT!  I was instructed to break her of this ridiculous habit or she wouldn’t find a home.  I must admit I did not want to break her of this habit because I felt it comforted her and honestly I found it so cute. 

As the months went on she milked at my heart so much that every evening I was on pins and needles hoping that she would come back home.  Eventually, I decided that she belonged in the family and I could not let her go.  

Serenity and Heyokah

I was in the process of moving into a new apartment by myself for the first time.  Lonely, hmmm, it never occurred to me.  But, of course, I did not move in by myself.  While moving boxes and furniture with my younger sister, Katherine, her cat Luna recently had kittens which were old enough to adopt to families.  I was adamant it was not a responsibility I was ready to take on.  Oh that lasted approximately 2 minutes then I saw the kittens, I was in love.

 

Over the course of several days, as I watched and interacted with them, I let names develop based on their personalities.  Serenity, the gray little girl, obviously received her name because she was low-key compared to the little boy.  He was so rambunctious and at the time I was reading about Native American Culture and came across the name “Heyokah” which means wild boy or something close to that, instant fit.  Still I got it wrong since as they grew up they switched personalities. 

 

I must admit that I was a bit obsessive with these two, they being my first children.  Yep, in my thirties, no children of my own, they were my children.  If either one of them showed any signs of distress I was at the vet’s immediately.  And once a week I made them a special dinner…….Catfish.  That’s right I bought a piece of fresh catfish every week, cooked it up for them and served it.  My thinking was that cat’s love fish and well, they are cat’s so why not catfish? 

The apartment building I moved into was managed by a couple that had many cats and the wife had recently become involved with one of the volunteer organizations for rescued and abandoned cats.  Before I knew it she asked me if I would be interested in fostering cats and kittens for the organization.  Serenity and Heyokah were still kittens, little ones, so I said I would give it a try, Opps, she enlisted my help with a Maine Coon!  That’s right this huge cat with my two little ones.  Every night when I drove home from work I prayed they were still alive. 

This set off two and a half years of fostering cats for the volunteer group.  During that time I took pictures of every single one of them, named most of them, adopted two of them and have yet to go through all my pictures to count how many I fostered.  I do know that at the peak level I had 23 cats and kittens living with me in our two bedroom apartment!  

Through various other means, which I will be writing about, I became the mother to not only 6 cats but 2 dogs, after purchasing my home.  All will be introduced here on the blog with stories about how they came into my life, some of the various health issues I learned can afflict our animal family, adventures and stories about each of them and the valuable lessons they have taught me about living and life.

Welcome

Welcome to my blog one and all.  Since I was a child I have always had an affinity with animals.  In my family, while growing up, we always had cats and dogs, usually one dog and two to three cats but sometimes two dogs.  My elderly mother still has a dog and three cats, all three of my sisters have dogs and have had cats, and alas my brother doesn’t have any nor ever has.  But he likes them and is great with all of ours.

That’s right; our poor brother was the only boy with four sisters!!!  On top of that sometimes miserable situation, he was stuck right in the middle, two older sisters and two younger sisters.  I think he understands women better than most.

As an adult I adopted my first two kitties in my mid-thirties and it exploded after that, those stories to come.  I had just moved into an apartment and for the first time was living single and alone when I adopted them, Serenity and Heyokah, and they became my children.  The joy I receive from all the animals in my life is truly immeasurable as I know many of you share.  This blog is intended to share my animal family (more than cats and dogs too), all that I have learned from them and be a place of positive uplifting insights, as well as share interesting places to visit and spoil our precious ones.

Enjoy!

Susan