A Cat Tale

 1/15/10

We currently have four male cats in our house. Not so long ago it was three which was more than enough thank you very much seeing as how I am allergic. These cats belong to my youngest daughter who obviously has me wrapped around her little finger on the cat issue. If I wasn't a cat lover myself maybe I could take a tougher stance, but I still marvel at how cleverly she got cat number four into the house a few months ago.


Since the first three boys have always treated my house as their personal cat toy no matter how many cat toys, scratching posts and cat towers we brought them I had told my daughter any new cats would not only be neutered as standard procedure but declawed as well. I had never had a cat declawed in my life and had some misgivings about the procedure. There is a wide range of thought about it in the cat world ranging from it's perfectly acceptable to it's psychotic mutilation.

I wasn't sure where I fell in that range of thought, but when our sweet kitten came home so groggy and pitiful looking an ugly voice began to whisper in my mind...."Mutilator...mutilatorrrrrrr."

Over the next few days watching our little guy favoring his paws and hearing his distressed calls when left alone for more than 10 minutes (he was sequestered in my daughter's room because he needed special litter while his paws healed) my guilt grew and grew. The ugly voice whispered almost incessantly. I felt like a criminal.

Long about the fifth day as I sat morbidly brooding on the whole declawing scenario I had a revelation. We had gotten the little guy "fixed" as we did with all our cats at the same time we had him declawed. I never in all my years of cat ownership had a doubt about the "rightness" of spaying and neutering and neither do the pundits of the animal kingdom. But, I thought, what if I asked the cat..."Which would YOU rather lose, your claws or your nuts?"

Poof! The doubts, misgivings, guilt and nasty whispering voice went up in smoke.

So what do I think? Sometimes perspective is everything.

The happy ending... our little guy can run, jump and climb with the best of them. He is dangerously happy and overactive from the homeowner's (in this case me) point of view. I am grateful at least once a day that we removed his claws.