Feral Fables

The kittens, all 5 of them, were not born at our house. They were born a few houses down on the other side of the alley, under a garage which is somewhat elevated. Snow (the mother cat) brought them down here to our house, under the deck when they were about 6 weeks old. They nestled under the deck, close to the house near where the dryer vents for warmth. I remember that winter during the really cold days I would intentionally do laundry to keep the dryer going, imagining that this would help them keep warm. Another thing we did after a snow storm, was we tried to fashion a box with a blanket and a cover. We shoved it under the deck thinking this would help, but it was never used. It was pretty pathetic looking I admit in retrospect.

By January, the cats all knew the sound of the screen door opening when I came out to feed them. They would climb out from under the deck and wait for me to come out. We had started to prop the screen door open so they could come into the screen porch that is off the back of the house. We started feeding there because of rain initially and then due to the snow. At least it was protected, even though it was just a screen porch. Eventually, the kittens would actually come onto the porch while I was putting the food out, never getting too close though. The mother-----well, she was a different story. She never came onto the porch with me present and she never ate before her kittens. She waited outside the porch door. When I went back into the house and her kittens were done eating, she would slowly enter the porch and eat. This took an extreme amount of trust on her part. Feral cats are very wary of any place with only one entrance. They are extremely afraid of being cornered. An ideal place for them to live has several ways to enter and leave. But this mother cat had not brought her kittens to just anybody------she had brought them to me, and I think she knew I would not hurt them. I think at some level it was instinctual-------the understanding we had.

Anyway----the back porch does have a corner which is protected by the brick house on to sides and this is where we set-up the next make-shift shelter, which did survive the winter. We took the stool part of one of those "papasan" chairs that you buy from Pier 1. We put a blanket down then the stool on top. We covered it with a bunch more blankets then topped it with a piece of beveled glass we had from a table. We made the entrance somewhat covered to protect them from any wind. That worked!! The cats spent the rest of the winter nestled in that little house on the porch.

It is strange to me that as I begin telling the story of "Feral Fables" which is so interconnected with hurricane Katrina, that another disaster in the Gulf has hit and with far more ferocity. I am sickened by the fall-out from this oil spill. I am moved to tears watching the pictures on the news showing the state of the wildlife or the devastating losses of the people who live there. It is a disaster of global proportion. My heart-felt prayers are offered to all.

So over the next few months as I healed, alone at home (my husband at work), I cared for the cats the best I could. Right after back surgery------I didn't even want to get out of bed, (even though I was supposed to get up and move around) but now I did have the cats to look after. In the beginning this was basically just putting out food for them. Sometimes this was quite humorous. Picture not being able to bend over or stoop down much (because of the stupid brace) and trying to feed a cat a bowl of kibble. There were times I literally just had to pour the kibble on the deck. The cats didn't mind though. But I got better at devising means of dispensing the food properly and over time my movement improved too. That winter, watching the cats was my (our) pastime. It became a habit-----always walking by the window or porch door to see "what's going on." I heard another writer coin this action as "cat patrol" which fits perfectly. One of the things you do to recover from the type of back surgery I had, is to walk. Well, in Wisconsin, in the middle of winter, nobody walks outside anywhere if they don't have to. So I used to do laps around the house and as I did them, I'd watch outside for any "cat action." I must have spent hundreds of hours that first winter on "cat patrol." The kittens had been born about Sept. 1 so that winter, they were learning about the world------which was my backyard. All the world unfolded to them with their mother, Snow, close by their sides and their other mother, me, never too far behind---always watching from the window, slowly healing with each day.

In August of 2005, when Katrina was destroying the entire Gulf Coast, I was flat on my back awaiting yet another back surgery. I was horrified by what I saw and yet felt so helpless. I could not jump in a car and drive down there to lend support. I could not go to my local church or shelter and pack-up boxes and load them on trucks. I could not stand on my feet all day and serve food to those doing heavy labor. I could give some money, but not a lot in the over all picture of things. I felt pretty helpless. I had my surgery which then involved wearing a hard brace for 3 months and then going through 3 or more months of therapy. One day, not long after I came home from the hospital, when my cleaning lady was at the house (something I have had to have for many years due to my back problems-not because I'm rich!) she called upstairs to me, "Debra----did you know you have a family of cats out here on your deck?" I certainly did not!! I slowly came downstairs to investigate this situation. There on the deck was a beautiful black and snowy white mother cat with her 5 kittens. It was starting to get really cold here in Wisconsin and I knew then......this was something I could do. I could feed and care for these cats. I could not save the Gulf Coast, but I could maybe save the lives in my backyard........That was the beginning of Feral Fables.