Antares and Montecor

Adopted 18 July 2004 in Tulsa -

A homeless cat was shot by a neighbor. Every neighborhood has sickos capable of that. Her two kittens, too young to survive without her, had been sighted by several people, not one of them willing to go out of their way to save them.  I set a trap in a backyard (with permission) where they had been last seen. A raccoon size humane trap, the only one I could buy or borrow on short order, posed a great risk to small animals due to the force with which it snaps. I tried to lure them out of their supposed hiding place with a kitten formula and sardine mix without success, but two hours later they both entered the trap --at once and unharmed: that's what I call "a miracle." They were about six weeks old, at the brink of remaining unsocial if not handled by humans promptly.

Both were afflicted with every possible parasite; some easily treated, but ringworm required long-term attention. I brought them home to both treat and socialize them – a balancing act which was doomed. At that crucial stage of development, forcing down a bitter potion every evening had the predictable results. Somehow I managed to complete the treatment, but they took refuge in the basement the instant I opened the door of their one-room habitat. I should have known better and kept them there long after the treatment to regain their trust.  Once they were out of reach, they were irretrievable. Today they surface to the main floor whenever they please if their caregiver Lanette Dietz is at work or at home alone with her pets.

 Antares and Montecor during 
their brief tame period

The “Black Brotherhood,” as I sometimes refer to the duo, were doing well as indoor cats, getting along with the other companion animals. In 2008, during the process of moving from Dhahran to Houston, I stayed in Tulsa while Chris started his new position and found a house to buy that was suitable to unify the pet family – i.e., the two dogs and one cat we brought from Saudi and the four tame cats we had left in Tulsa. The matter of taking the Black Brotherhood with us to Houston was under study. But Basmah (Blog bio 16 SEP 13), the one-eyed cat we rescued in Dhahran, squashed our hopes for unification. For reasons of her own, Basmah terrorized the two shy cats –none of the others—pushing them into even deeper hiding than before.

The usual partial sightings of an eye or a tail atop the AC ducts became rare, and one day Antares just disappeared. After combing every crevice of the house I convinced myself that he had somehow escaped from Barsmah’s relentless torment.  I panicked.

Small incidents can change the course of individual lives and, thus, history, as so cleverly illustrated by Thornton Wilder in “The Bridge Over San Luis Rey.” As I said, I panicked; I had never lost a living being before and I would never rest if I did. Having done all I could do, and being scheduled to fly to Houston the next day to look at houses, I did the unthinkable: I prayed.

As an Atheist of Catholic stock, my prayers consist of bargaining with whatever is in charge. “Give me back Antares and ...” Now comes the barter, which must hurt the supplicant or it doesn’t work. (What I knew of Houston after many short business trips through the years, was that I didn’t want to live there and planned minimal involvement in the community.) But insane with concern for my cat I continued: “... I will volunteer at the Houston SPCA for one year! Pleeeeeease.”

Antares surfaced in minutes. Talk about the power of prayer and its consequences. Exhilaration, heartbreak, and long-term consquences were all part and parcel of volunteering for three years at HSPCA where I adopted Astra and Janowitz (Blog bios 1 JUN 09 and 29 NOV 12), fostered and found homes for Yi-Bo, Latha, Pinto, and others, met BFFs Karen Cordero, Christina Heldman, Renata Saintive, Helena Vandierendonk ... participated in Spanish radio and television outreach programs ... HSPCA turned out to be a privileged observation post for human and nonhuman behavior. All of it because Antares was hiding from me.

Volunteer 

An adult Montecor staring at the bird feeder

We moved the menagerie to Houston in 2008. Transporting the cats was made possible by one of Tulsa’s finest, Officer Shellie Wood, who drove the SUV unerringly despite the caterwauling of Basmah, Pomponia, Pertinax, Calpurnia, and Sultana ... and me.

The Black Brotherhood, however, stayed in Tulsa. Had we chanced to trap them, the mad gamble of subjecting feral cats to a new environment with no good hiding spaces, no basement, and Basmah at their necks would have backfired. Most of the same considerations applied in 2012, when we moved to Fayetteville, Arkansas.

For the time being, Antares and Montecor have each other in a familiar, serene environment with dogs and a cat they tolerate, and Lanette who reports regularly about their health and antics, and occasionally even snaps a photo of Montecor, who deep inside wants to be tame.