If purring could be encapsulated, it would be the most powerful anti-depressant on the market.
~Terri Guillemets
I hadn’t worked at the animal shelter long when an old cat, probably around thirteen, arrived. She had been declawed on all four paws, had an odd color in one eye, and a litter-box problem, which was why she was being surrendered to the shelter. This cat was absolutely beautiful, though. We named her Sally.
Sally was a sweet cat from the beginning. I took great pains to make sure she was well cared for. She always had a blanket to lie on and got a special kind of food. She would play sometimes, and that cheered me a little. She got a few looks, of course, but her inability to properly use a litter box always warded people away. Not to mention, she was old. How many more years did that cat really have left? Some days, I worried she’d never see daylight again.
Then one day, a glimmer of hope appeared in the form of an older lady. Her hair was white and her hands were wrinkled, but her eyes shone with such liveliness. She asked immediately about the old cat, never once looking at the others in the room. I’m not sure how she had heard about her, whether she had seen the cat in the paper or a friend had informed her of the feline’s precarious situation.
This lady began coming in every day around 3:00 in the afternoon. While at the shelter, she would sit in front of Sally’s cage and talk to her. I would occasionally leave the room, finding it rude to eavesdrop, but some days I stayed and listened. She’d tell Sally about her day, and talk about how if she came home with her, she’d have a good life.
Unfortunately, she didn’t want to adopt a cat that was old and might not be around long. She worried about the cat’s odd eye and other possible ailments, including Kidney failure. It was an understandable concern. My boss decided to get blood work on the cat, which the lady insisted she would pay for. At first, the blood work looked good, but a week later we had no choice but to tell her we had gotten a bad sample. We would have to draw blood again, and it would be at least another week before we had any answers.
I overheard the lady speaking to Sally that afternoon, and I had to leave the room as tears pricked my eyes at the soft, secretive words of one elderly citizen to another. “I know how it feels. I’ve had to get blood work done a few times myself.” Sally blinked lovingly at the lady as she curled in her lap. The lady stroked her almost absentmindedly. “Don’t worry. I’m old, too. I know how it feels.”
After weeks of tender moments, agonizing waiting and many, many tests, the lady did end up adopting Sally. I secretly worried Sally wouldn’t last another year.
A year later, I was proven wrong when the lady returned to the shelter and gave me several photos of Sally, whose name was now Cassie. She still wouldn’t use the litter box all the time, but the lady didn’t mind. She said a few messes were worth Cassie’s company.
She told me she wanted me to know how Cassie was doing since she remembered that the old cat had been one of my favorites. She was right. I had been so concerned that no one would see past that sweet cat’s age and her minor issues. All it took was one wise elderly lady to see the potential in another very sweet senior citizen. And just a bit of faith that everything would work out like it was meant to.
~Ashley Ledlow
