Tito

...also known around here as Thomas Asparagus.

There was this little gray tabby who took up here this month and he caused all kinds of commotion and drama and anxiety and joy and slow blinks and purring. Our house has become sort of a Kitty Central since Christmas with the five (sometimes six) feral cats who come here to eat.  Well, one day, this little fellow showed up and he wasn't feral.  He was sweet and let me touch him and he rubbed up against my leg, all the things that tame kitties do.  He never hissed once and he followed me around.  He made himself right at home on the front porch, too.

Not having any idea where he came from, I started calling him Thomas Asparagus.  Thomas after my daddy and Asparagus after my and Larry's favorite vegetable.  Cute, right?

I found out from my neighbors that he belonged to someone on the street right next to ours and that she had gotten him from some folks who lived out in the country, said he was always an outside cat and that he was "being aggressive" with another cat they had.  So they gave him away.  Seething, I was.  I am a firm believer in once you get a pet, he or she is YOURS for life.  You don't "get rid" of them.  Since we live in a subdivision, it's really not smart to have an outside pet of any kind.  They get out, Animal Control gets 'em and we all know they are murderers over there.  I tried to get Thomas back to his second mama but he got away from us.  At night.  In the rain.  That's when we found out his name was Tito.  Tito had been living the thug life in the neighborhood and he'd gotten in a fight with one of the toms and had been badly bitten on his head.  By the time I got really involved, his eye had almost swollen shut.  

Here he is at the window talking to me and Tabbie Hoffman.

Oh, I wanted him.  I wanted him bad.  But my first obligation and responsibility is to Tabbie.  He's never climbed a tree or jumped a fence, doesn't even know he's a cat at all and I'd like to keep it that way.  I could not let Tito teach him about life on the streets.  No matter how much I cried.  I couldn't do it.  

But I could help Tito!  I could make a difference in his little life.  By this time, though, his wound was badly swollen, abscessing probably, and he was in a lot of pain.  He wouldn't let me get him.  He scratched and hissed and pitched pretty good fits.  I went and got a bed, a litter box and a crate.  Larry set the Havahart trap and we caught him. 

I got him in the crate and tried to calm him down.  He had been pawing his wound and it had started to drain.  And probably felt so much better!  The next morning, I took him to the vet and I had his little head wound (FOUR bites!) cleaned, got him an antibiotic shot and a rabies shot, just because.  

This was him that morning.  His eye was almost completely open!  He was sweet and friendly again, too.  I sang "Jesus Loves Me" and "Puff The Magic Dragon" to him in the car and then brought him back home.

I called his first mama and talked to her.  She sounded about 14 on the phone but she was married and expecting her first baby in two weeks.  She really, really wanted Tito back but he was being a bully to her other cat, a girl.  Guess what, though?  Tito still had all his boy parts.  I convinced her that if she got him fixed, he would calm down, get all mellow and stuff and stop trying to run off at night.  He'd just lay around and get fat and sassy like my Tabbie. 

She came and picked him up and she told me that she'd made an appointment for him to be neutered yesterday and I said a little prayer yesterday morning that all would go well.  I hope it did and that he's happy being back at home.  His real home.