My brother had Tiger and I had a brown tabby cat named Pizza. (I have a hard time talking about him, partially because it hurts still, and partially because so many people get stuck on the name and are sniggering under their breath whenever I say it, so often I feel it's pointless to try to talk about him.)
Then my brother grew up and left home, and Tiger, unable to go with him, considered herself abandoned and in her opinion, I was not an adequate substitute. She would allow me to provide a lap for her, when she felt like having lap cat time. She would spend time with me if she wanted a human. Sometimes she preferred my mother to be the human. Sometimes, not often, my father. I was never close to Tiger. She was a bit of a tyrant and cranky to boot, and I although I tried dutifully to love her, as she had no one else ... she was very difficult to love.
I loved my cat Pizza, very much, and he rather took care of me. He was my emotional guardian during some times that weren't so nice, and he loved me so much that even when he was dying of a cancer that was visibly eating him alive, he didn't want to go. He didn't want to leave me alone. It was the hardest decision I ever made. And I still don't know if it was the right one.
Fifteen years ago ...
And so there I was, in the agony of grief, accompanied by Tiger, who may not have loved me but she certainly had loved her brother cat. I knew what you were supposed to do. You were supposed to adopt another cat to love and not wallow in your grief. I didn't think I could possibly love anyone else after Pizza died, but I tried to do what I was supposed to do.
Only I couldn't bear the thought of adopting a random kitten and having him or her turn out like Tiger; a cat who merely tolerated me, and my inability to truly love her a constant source of regret. I wanted a cat like Pizza, a cat who loved me back. There'd been a cat before Pizza. Tiger's other littermate, a girl kitty I chose and named Little Miss Muffet. She'd run away while she and Tiger were still indoor-outdoor cats. (Tiger became indoors only after that, and when Pizza joined us, so was he.) Little Miss Muffet hadn't loved me any more than Tiger did.
So I looked up cat breeds, finding cats who had Pizza's peculiar broad shoulders and stocky body, and then read to see if they matched his personality. Pizza had short hair, not long hair, and he wasn't an enormous cat (although you could have fooled me when he was on my lap and incredibly heavy), but the cat breed who most matched him was the Maine Coon.
Then I looked up cat breeders and found one not twenty minutes from my house. I knew you were supposed to look at several breeders to make sure you found one that wasn't just churning out kittens, a backyard breeder, but instead one who cared about the bloodlines and making sure they weren't inbreeding and stuff like that.
I went to this breeder (and I'm not going to name names--they were not a good place and they shut down years ago) to do the checking them out thing that you were supposed to do. I'd never been to any other cattery. I really didn't know what I was looking for.
I did have enough sense to know myself, and to know that I shouldn't play with or pick up any kitten already promised to someone else. How horrible it would be to fall in love with a kitten I couldn't have!
The woman showed me around. Her house was spotless. You'd never know she had any cats. That was because all the cats were in (large) cages in the basement. It was a nice basement, not dark or damp like ours had been in the house when I was little (we'd moved since then). But it quite took me aback, seeing all the cats in cages like that.
Note here: just because a cattery does not raise their kittens "underfoot" doesn't make them a bad cattery. But it does mean the kittens haven't a single clue about human house life, which can be a problem if you don't have time to teach them all about everything. Imagine bringing a human toddler into your house who'd never seen sinks or toilets or washing machines or beds. They'd spend half the time terrified and half the time getting themselves into serious trouble!
When a cat was going to have her kittens, she got moved to a cage upstairs in the sunroom. I didn't really like that arrangement either. But what did I know? I was just making mental notes, reserving judgement until I had something to compare it to.
The cats all seemed very friendly and eager to see you. I didn't realize at the time, and in fact only now that I've seen how Max reacted to me when I was gone all day and he was so lonely and bored, but these cats were too eager to see me, too eager to be petted.
And then the woman showed me a litter that was ready to go to their homes. In fact, most of them had already gone. I think there was only one or two other ones left. But that one, she said, doesn't have anybody to take him yet.
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| Before he was Pippin, younger than 3 months |
He looked into my face. He gave a little contented sigh. And then he went back to sleep, cuddled up against my shoulder, all the trust in the world, right there in one little orange furry bundle.
I hadn't come to buy a kitten. I was certainly not ready to bring a kitten home. I was not doing this. No. I was going to scope out several breeders. I was going to do this thing by the book. I was certainly not taking this little red kitten home with me.
And I didn't. I managed to get through the entire night without calling her back and saying, panicky, you didn't sell him yet did you? I want him!
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| Pippin comes home with me |
When I brought him home it was late August 1999. He was four months old. When I took him to my vet for his well-baby checkup, she saw cataracts in his eyes. He was just a kitten! There was a specialist, an ophthalmologist who mostly worked in the next state over but once a month came to a vet place near me. I took him there, and the ophthalmologist confirmed the presence of partial cataracts.
He said Pippin could probably see as well as a near-sighted human could see. Well, I was a near-sighted human (extremely) and I figured we'd get along just fine. The vet specialist also said that two things can cause cataracts in a very young kitten. Either genetic birth defect, or abuse to the mother while she was pregnant.
Well, I thought I should call the breeder right away to let her know that those two cats shouldn't be bred together again, since obviously there were bad genetics at work here. I wasn't expecting her to offer to take him back or even to offer a partial refund; I simply thought she should know something which affected her breeding program.
She didn't offer to take him back. She didn't offer a partial refund. She flatly refused to believe me and said I didn't know what I was talking about. So I had the vet mail her a copy of the report. She never contacted me. I didn't contact her again, because by now I had seen quite enough of the timid, terrified way Pippin behaved to have concluded that since the breeder didn't care about the genetics, it was because she knew darn well how he came to have cataracts, and it was because she or her husband had abused Pippin's mother. Because Pippin certainly acted as if humans had abused him.
I still don't know for sure if he was abused before he came to me. That woman could have been inbreeding and just didn't care that the genetics were bad for those two cats. Pippin was always a very cautious, careful cat who wanted permission before he changed anything about his environment. He might have simply been born that way; I have since heard of other cats who were like that. I mean, apparently, most Persians are like that, which is why you see them in houses with lots of decorative items (they won't play with something unless you tell them it's okay).
But I do know that you can clearly see the cataract in his left eye (which was always the bad one) in the photo she took of him before I ever saw him, the photo she had on her website for him. And perhaps that is why no one had bought him before I came along, blissfully ignorant of the true extent of some people's greed.
I'm glad no one else got him. Very few people would have understood a cat like Pippin. I believe he and I were destined to be together. I didn't mind the partial blindness, or the cardiomyopathy that developed later. I wouldn't give up the time we had with each other for anything. He was such a special, loving, wonderful personality.
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