I received many kind messages from readers after posting my last entry about the death of Miss Thing. Thanks to all of you who wrote with your sympathy. There are a lot of fellow animal lovers out there.
Today I wanted to write a little about Girlfriend, my surviving cat. She’s ten, the same age as Miss Thing, and still very healthy, thank goodness. Many of my closest friends have never really met Girlfriend, despite frequent visits to my home. She’s extremely shy with strangers, although not with my husband or with me.
Unfortunately for Girlfriend, a few months ago she was diagnosed with a skin allergy that meant I would need to start giving her medication. Her suspicion of all unusual foods meant that hiding the medicine inside a treat was out of the question. The only alternative was to give her a small pill, every single day. As I stood in the small treatment room while the vet explained this to me, my stomach fell. Girlfriend was returned to her carrier and I moved abstractedly out into the waiting area with my mind racing ahead, trying to envision getting anything into Girlfriend that she didn’t want to eat.
When I admitted to Lori, the woman behind the desk, that I’d never given a pill to a cat before, she told me brightly that she’d bring out their “demonstration kitty” to show me how it was done. I waited at the desk for a moment, and she soon reappeared with a real live cat, instead of the stuffed one I was expecting. This handsome gray male, didn’t put up any more fuss than a stuffed cat, as she gently tipped his head back and opened his mouth with one hand, putting the pill far back into his throat with the other. As she held his mouth closed, the cat swallowed calmly and the whole thing was over in seconds. “That’s all there is to it,” I was told.
The next morning I attempted to repeat the trick with my own feline, but things didn’t go quite as smoothly. Already disgruntled with me because of the previous day’s visit to the vet, Girlfriend eyed me suspiciously as I approached her with the pill on a small saucer. The second I set it down and knelt beside her, she took off like a shot and raced downstairs to hide under a bed. Down I went after her and spent an undignified few minutes trying to get her out. I’m ashamed to admit I finally resorted to encouraging her with a broom handle. When this finally succeeded, Girlfriend zoomed out from under the bed like an orange rocket and raced back up the stairs to the living room. I followed more slowly, closing the bedroom door behind me. As I appeared at the top of the stairs, the cat shot me a baleful glare and zipped past me to an upstairs bedroom to hide under another bed. By this time, both of us had lost our cool. Girlfriend was increasingly angry and determined, and so was I. Hair flying, the two of us charged up and down the stairs of my small house for five solid minutes. I didn’t have any illusions about my own agility compared to hers, but I thought I could prove to her that I had more stamina. After both of us were panting and disheveled, she finally allowed me to catch up to her.
Remembering the demonstration from the day before, I tried to gently tip her head back and open her mouth. She was having none of it. Brute force allowed me to get her stiff neck tilted back, but her jaws remained stubbornly clenched. I finally used my left arm to clamp her into position while my right forefinger forced her front teeth open. To her credit, she didn’t try to bite, but as her feet scrabbled for purchase on the floor, I took some collateral damage from her claws. Finally getting the teeth apart, I stuffed the tiny pill in and clamped her mouth closed again. The cat continued to struggle, coughing and working her tongue violently in an effort to push the pill back out. I kept her under my arm and held her mouth until she finally swallowed convulsively and I gingerly let go. With a bound, she leapt into a corner and backed up to face me, crouched low on all fours, gripping the carpet as though daring me to try picking her up again. This ended the first day’s skirmish. One point to me. The two of us spent the remainder of the day maintaining a dignified silence and avoiding eye contact.
The next morning when I went to look for her, she was nowhere to be found. After more than ten minutes of fruitless searching, checking all her usual hiding places, I realized she’d taken up a position in the cellar utility room behind the water heater. In this spot, she’s completely impossible to dislodge, since I can’t reach her or even see her once she’s wedged herself back there. No pill for her that morning. One point to Girlfriend.
She continued her boycott throughout that day, but by next morning she’d had to come out since both food and litter box are in the kitchen upstairs. Rather than confront her immediately at the food dish, I ran downstairs to lock her out of the laundry room. All other closeable doors safely shut, I was ready to do battle again.
Back upstairs, she saw me coming for her and ran for the laundry room. As I followed inexorably, she skidded to a stop in front of the latched door. In dismay, she pawed vainly at the door once, then gave it up as a loss and zipped past me heading back to the living room. She passed the bedroom and rejected it, since it hadn’t helped the previous day. I felt like the Frankenstein monster, lumbering after her speedy form. A few more times up and down stairs, and then she finally retreated to the living room corner behind an armchair. The running was over. She allowed me to reach in and pull her out without struggling, although her dead weight would have done Gandhi proud in conveying the spirit of passive resistance. With utter stoicism, she remained still while I held her head and tipped it back. Once again, I had to prize her mouth open in order to get the pill in, then quickly clamp it shut.
This time, there was no reaction from Girlfriend. No hacking cough or tongue rolling like the day before. But no visible swallowing either. I made the mistake of loosening my grip for a moment, only to watch as the little Randle Patrick McMurphy quickly spit the pill out and ran from the room. I was left with a soggy pill, a tee shirt covered in cat hair, and the embarrassment of being outsmarted by a cat.
There’s often a moment in the old Warner Brothers’ cartoons when Daffy will pause, look into the camera and say, “Of course you realize, this means war.” I knew I could never out-run her, but I also knew I could out-last her. No matter how many times she ran up and down the stairs, eventually she’d get tired and I’d make my move.
The good thing about Girlfriend is that despite the willfulness, she’s also a stoic at heart. Plus she can learn to put up with almost anything as long as it becomes part of her routine. So we’ve finally come to a workable arrangement. I get her at the same time every day, carry her to the same place on the carpet and tell her she’s a good girl in the same tone of voice. Thus it has become normal for her, and she actually waits for me in the same corner. We both get it over with early, before breakfast, and then we can go on with our respective days. Whew!
