I remember Kaiba

I remember the first day I met Kaiba – seven years ago. Not Seto-Kaiba, the animated Japanese anti-hero. No, more like heavy-set Kaiba, the fear-frozen Errington St. stray from Chelmsford.

He was brought to the Animal Control for that area a few months before it became “Greater Sudbury Animal Shelter.” For a long time – 20 years actually – I have tried to bring out and find homes for the pound’s previously fixed cats – and fix some of their most loveable cats to make them adoptable.

Kaiba did not have a captivating personality. When Richard Jr., shelter manager, tried to gently put Kaiba (known as “Errington” at the time) into a carrying case, this black and white cat made himself even wider and hissed and spit like a giant cobra.

I was no longer certain that this was a good cat to bring home, but Richard assured me, “He’s just scared.”

(And was likely thinking, if she doesn’t take him, there goes the budget for cat food for this month!)

Richard finally had to lower this chubby stray into a large carrier while I held the carrier up and the door open. I cannot remember how we were able to vaccinate, deworm and check him for fleas and mites, but we must have. I got help carrying Kaiba and three others out to my van.

Kaiba was a two-handed carry, in any event. His weight would have been too much for the handle.

My husband of then only 27 years helped carry this shipment of cats into the kids’ computer game room in the basement. You may think it a little cruel to force the kids to share space with cats and cat litter, to have their console wires chewed at and peed on.

I didn’t – I hated the computer games. While the kids were rotting their minds, they might as well be socializing cats.

Kaiba needed lots of socializing. He was a 'fraidy cat. He may have been the biggest of that batch of rescues, but he thought he was a tiny baby and had a high tiny “mew” to go with it. It wasn’t even a “meow.”

Eventually he came out of hiding – I expect the kids had to pull the furniture out from the wall so he’d have enough space to hide. And he moved into Elaine’s lap and went “purr, purr, purr, purr.” Though even that was quiet.

For a variety of reasons – mostly that he didn’t get adopted – he joined our family. Sort of. Kaiba didn’t like other cats and certainly didn’t like dogs. But he did like Elaine and found out which bedroom door was hers – not so easy since all three of the kids still at home kept their doors shut.

Easier to hide from chores if mom thinks you’ve gone out or are out of sight, hence out of mind.

And so the new routine began. Kaiba on one side of the door, “Scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch,” until Elaine let him in.

And then a half hour later, “Scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch,” until Elaine let him out. Repeat an hour or two later, and so on. And we wonder why Elaine has disordered sleeping?

Kaiba had a limited range of activity, which explains why he never managed to lose the weight. He never showed any interest in going outside, which is just as well since he was a fox’s dream – pure lard and immobilized when scared.

A few months ago Kaiba started to lose weight but we didn’t think anything of it. Since he was probably about 13 years old, we thought it likely a good thing. And then he seemed to even out, but then drastically dropped more weight and started to show a tinge of yellow.

You may be wondering why we didn’t pick up on this earlier? We have a multi-cat household of rescues – I do mean multi-cat.

As long as a cat is sleeping comfortably 22 out of 24 hours, and during the remaining other two hours, grooming him or herself, eating, drinking and using the litter box – we don’t pay them much mind.

I was in no hurry to bring Kaiba to the vet for euthanasia – he was comfy enough sleeping on the towels under the bathroom counter and peeing on the bathroom floor. Finally the day came when he was having trouble moving around and it seemed more cruel to let him live then to give him a kind death. As per usual when Elaine and I took Kaiba anywhere (i.e. to the vet or for a grooming), he peed all over me, all over his kennel, and on the seat of the van. On the way out I told him the story of his life – as I knew it – as he shook and mewed.

On arrival the vet tech immediately put us in an examining room and I put Kaiba on a dry towel on the table and patted him. The vet came in and sedated him immediately.

I would stay with him until he was completely asleep and then leave for the administration of the euthanizing drug.

The vet and I shared how it doesn’t get any easier, no matter how many times we’ve overseen a euthanasia. In fact, I find it gets harder. This sounds like a weird thing to say, but death is cumulative. It takes its toll on the living as well as the dead.

My deal with the Big Guy in the Sky is that for every cat I have to euthanize, I take in two more from the shelter. Small Things had already taken in a starved and dehydrated calico cat left in someone’s vacant apartment, and a fellow volunteer had asked me to please bring the cat found on Donnelly to the shop – he’d been at the shelter for two months! That was my two.

But when I was at the shelter, one of the staff brought in two owner-surrendered cats – mature and terrified. Much like Kaiba had been. (Donnelly could have cared less where he was – three hots and a cot – woo hoo!)

So I brought Min Min and Butterscotch as well to Small Things and put them in an area we have sectioned off for a “multi-cat entry” – cats who know each other, but who are too terrified to join the kitty clan.

This was not a smart thing to do, bringing in more cats. Our adoptions are at an all time low, we close at Christmas, and in the New Year we have to find a new location – but it was a “heart” thing to do. Finding homes for broken spirits like Kaiba, Min Min and Butterscotch makes our hearts merry.

And finding a new “inn” for Small Things and our twelve homeless kitties would be PURRfect.

Jan Carrie Steven is a volunteer with Cat Adoption Trust Sudbury (CATS) and the co-ordinator of Small Things: Cats & Books & Things. For more information, go to www.smallthings.ca.