A stare of desperation from Chocolate Chip.

Yesterday afternoon, a small cat blocked an alley I was driving through. Wouldn’t move, just stood there, staring at me. Staring, and not moving. I honked the horn lightly, inched forward a bit, nothing. Just staring at me. Ahh hell. I was in a hurry, but I also love cats, so I got out and tried to shoo it away, but again, it just stared, immobile. Jesus flippin’ salami. I reached down and petted it, noting it’s bony spine. Very bony spine. It finally starts moving – towards my truck. No. Noooo. Go away cat, I’m going to be late. SHOOOO.

No. Staring at me still, it approaches the open drivers door. Ahh crap. I pick it up, put it in the back end, drive back to my apartment, rush inside and put it in my bathroom, along with a bowl of water and a plate of fresh wet food. Closing the door, I exit the apartment, noting the looks of extreme concern on MY two cats – “What the f_ _ k was THAT thing, and why is it in our house?” they seemed to be saying.

Several hours later, I arrived home, anxious to see an empty plate of food and a purring cat, waiting for whatever it was waiting for. I stopped at the store on my way home and arrived laden with all the necessities – litter pan, food and water bowl, soft bed. Figured I’d make the little thing comfortable while it stayed with me, and then I’d plan a course of action.

I found a mess. Sitting in a puddle of pungent urine on my bathroom floor, eyes almost completely shut with some type of black crust, matted fur, the insides of her ears black with greasy grime. Nails that have gone untrimmed for a long time. There’s a sad phenomenon whereby a cats claw will grow back into the pad of its own foot, in a hook shape, and embed itself in the paw if it remains untrimmed. It must be painful, I guess. She had four of ten front nails doing this. These nails hadn’t been trimmed in years.

Emaciated. She was skin and bone. Literally. Very little muscle tone, really unable to walk, hence her failure to move as my truck approached her. She just stared. And waited.

I cleaned her eyes, her ears, trimmed her nails. She was a filthy mess. All the while, that bony spine, those pronounced ribs and hips. Literally skin and bone.

She spent the night in my bathroom, inside a box, on her new soft bed, with a new box of litter and a dish of water and tuna fish close by. She ate and drank nothing, all night long. She used the litter box one time. I woke up around 2 a.m. with the thought that she could probably use a little company. Maybe I needed the company. Regardless. So, I went into the bathroom, and put an old towel on my lap, and put her on my lap, and started scratching her. She started purring. It was an old purr. It spoke of internal mechanisms that are shutting down, that have seen better days. She flexed her front claws repeatedly, what cat people call “making biscuits”, a sign of contentment. We sat there, I on my toilet in a room that reeked of cat pee and a sick animal, she on a towel, stretched out across my warm lap, purring like your grandfather’s 1975 pickup truck – roughly, tired, wanting a break, wishing to sleep, eternally.

I went back to bed, and woke this morning to more mess on the bathroom floor, only this time it wasn’t urine. She wasn’t in her bed anymore, she was on the tile floor, looking sad.

I worked a few years at the front desk of the shelter I brought her to this afternoon, and recall seeing only two or three cats in worse condition than this one. Often, when a pet owner commits to having a pet euthanized, they would ask me if they were making the right decision, because even though their pet had been ill and  lethargic and depressed for weeks, maybe months, years,  “today suddenly, she just looks so alive, or he’s perked up and wagging his tail, are we doing the right thing?”  Yes, you’re doing the right thing, your pet realizes it’s suffering is going to end, and it is expressing relief. They know. They know. And owners see it, all the while wondering if a miracle has occured, and reconsidering is an option. It’s not.

She perked up on the ride to the shelter. She was sitting up inside the carrier, looking around curiously. Her ears were at attention. A frightened cat lies still, ears often flattened. She was alive, she was hopeful, and as her body was shutting down, her spirit was happy. She knew.

I did the paperwork with the girl at the front desk, then said a quick goodbye to this skinny dying cat. She was staring again. Right at me, with her bright green eyes.

Memories of good food, of good rubs, of clean litterboxes, of soft beds and good living. Who knows what happened to leave her on her own, body breaking down and disease having its way with her as she struggled for survival as a stray. Skin and bones, and memories. And yesterday afternoon, with a stare and the will to stand firm and not move, she forced my hand. She’d had enough, and played her card.

A little over an hour ago, she was euthanized. I’m guessing she was around seventeen years old, and, well, fuckin’a man, I’m just damn sad right now. The world and it’s bullshit can kiss my ass. The politics, politicians, the government’s and the wars, the greed and corruption and insanity, the games and the cruelty, the despair and the hate, the anger, callousness, sarcasm and humanity  – none of it matters a hill of beans to me right now.

I don’t form connections with humans. A staring human wouldn’t receive this treatment from me. But a cat – a dog – a lizard – yeah, these I’ll help. Not sure what that says about me, but good or bad, that’s me.

What a world we live in where we force suffering to continue. What a load of pig shit when a bureaucrat with an agenda says “No – you may NOT choose to end your life, because in order to retain my job, I must appear to care about the sanctity of human life and deny you the opportunity to be humanely euthanized.” What a world it truly is, where a cat can stare, and in that stare convey a message of exhaustion and pleading, and in so doing, receive freedom from what had to be agonizing suffering.

A damn cat.

Before she was euthanized today, shelter staff had to assign her a name, for the records. Well, they don’t have to, but often they do. They named her Chocolate Chip. And she’s free now.