The Boys

Several weeks before my vacation I got a phone call from my friend Tracy, in Seldovia. Tracy is the one who allowed both Thing & Djuna to come live with me, for which I am eternally grateful. This time, she had news of two boys in desperate need of a home.

I have inherited many traits from my mother such as my strength of character, an inordinate fondness for socks, and the complete inability to say no to an animal in need. I am smart enough to realize that I simply cannot have 4 cats, however, so I agreed to rescue the boys only as a foster parent. The Devon Rex Rescue Group agreed to find them a permanent home as soon as they could, and I agreed to house them until then.

So that’s how Floyd and Thorvald came to live with me. I put them up in the spare room upstairs with a litter box in one corner, a scratching post in another corner, and an electric blanket on the bed.

Thor was a tiny cream colored cat, and was beyond cute with a smudgy little face that just made you want to kiss him every time you saw him. His favorite thing to do was to curl up in your lap and snuggle.

Floyd was white with big green eyes, and was huge. The average Devon weighs perhaps 7 pounds – he weighed 18. His hair was softer than a chenille blanket, though, and he had the biggest ears I’d ever seen on a cat. Oddly enough, he was completely deaf. He also had some sort of neurological thing going on, making his head wobble all the time.

First thing I did after their arrival was get them a doctor’s appointment. Dr. Kavenaugh, at The Pet Stop, gave the boys a thorough examination, administered their shots, clipped their toe nails, and cleaned out their ears. She sent them home with eye drops to clear up some conjunctivitis, and pronounced them healthy.

Finding a home for them turned out to be more difficult than I expected, and took a lot longer than I ever thought it would. The issue was exacerbated by the fact that I needed to clean that spare room out and get it rented to help pay my bills. Thankfully, however, a home was eventually found – the boys are now happily (I hope) living in Homer with their new human.