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David McElroy

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THE McELROY ZOO: Meet Oliver, the furball who taught me to love cats

By David McElroy · July 10, 2011

I didn’t want to live with a cat. I certainly didn’t want to live with a cat in my house. I was certain that I didn’t like cats. I was wrong.

Years ago, my ex-wife wanted a cat. She had grown up with felines and had great memories of them. I had grown up with a father who would sooner spontaneously combust than have an animal inside his perfect house, so I knew very, very little of cats or dogs from experience. At best, I was indifferent. But Melissa wanted a cat, so I decided to find one for her.

It was my sister, Mary, who found a stray kitten in Mountain Brook, which is an upscale Birmingham suburb very close to the local zoo. I had mentioned to her that I was looking for a cat, so she called me to come take a look when Melissa wasn’t around — so it would be a surprise for her. I went to Mary’s apartment to see this tiny furball who seemed more like a starving street urchin than the healthy kittens I’d seen in cat food commercials.

I got got down on the floor with him. He came over to me and rubbed against my face — gingerly at first, but then with abandon. I smiled and suddenly felt warmer inside. I didn’t want a cat, but something inside me did. What was I getting into?

For the first couple of weeks that Melissa and I had this little fellow, we were still living in an old high-rise apartment building on Southside that didn’t allow pets. We had just bought a condo in a suburb south of town, but we couldn’t move in quite yet. The apartment manager’s office was in the lobby of the building, which we had to walk through to leave each morning on the way to work. For those two weeks, we smuggled him in and out each day in a bag, always hoping that this wouldn’t be the day he would announce his presence right as the manager eyed us. She didn’t catch us.

I quickly came to love Oliver. We named him for the orphan in the Charles Dickens novel, because he had truly been that pathetic when we found him. He grew fairly quickly into a big cat, topping out at about 18 pounds, leaving us to joke that he had simply escaped from the zoo when Mary found him in Mountain Brook. We think he he was probably part Maine coon. I discovered that I liked and appreciated the cat personality. I loved his odd mixture of independence and affection. Soon, I couldn’t imagine life without a cat.

When Christmas season came the first year we had him, we put up a tree and didn’t think much about it. Oliver didn’t sleep with us, simply because I hadn’t really wanted a cat in the bed at night — a holdover from the attitude I’d learned as a child. On the first morning after the tree went up, I opened the bedroom door to find Christmas decorations strewn down the hall. I followed them to the living room, where I found a destroyed tree and decorations spread around the room as evenly as if they’d been blown to bits. This guy had had a fun night.

Oliver came to be a chubby fellow. OK, let’s be blunt. He was fat. I wasn’t too concerned about it. The guy liked to eat and I didn’t think it made any difference, so he lived a happy and chubby life for his first four years. He knew that his food was kept in a small plastic container in the refrigerator, so he eventually learned to open the ‘fridge. All in all, it was an entertaining life. Any cat owner would recognize it, but it was all new to me.

It was also new to me after four years when he quit eating and started losing weight. We took him to the vet, but the vet couldn’t figure out what was wrong. He was so fat that the vet couldn’t feel much of his body to see what was going on. We just had to keep watching him and hoping he would start eating again. After a couple of weeks of this, he had lost enough weight for the vet to feel something. It seemed as though Oliver had tumors, so he had to have immediate surgery.

I was at work on the day of the surgery, and I was thinking that he would probably be fine. But Melissa got a call from the vet after a couple of hours. “Our little buddy didn’t make it,” the vet said.

It turned out that Oliver had several tumors in advanced states. He was so weak by the time of the surgery that he died from the trauma of the operation. He never had a chance.

Losing Oliver was tough for me, because I’d never lost an animal. Melissa had lost them before, but it still wasn’t easy for her. My first thought was that I didn’t want another cat. If losing them hurt this much, was it really worth it? I quickly got past that shortsighted notion.

Less than a week after Oliver’s death, we had another baby furball in the house. I came to love Oscar and treasure him, but that’s a story for another time. Even though Oliver was gone, he still had a huge presence in my home and in my heart — because he was the one who first taught me to love cats.

Editor’s note: If you enjoyed meeting Munchkin, you might enjoy previous articles about Munchkin, Sam, Maggie, Henry, Lucy, Amelia, Charlotte and Emily.

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This was the Monday evening sunset. While I was wa This was the Monday evening sunset. While I was waiting for the right color and light, a swarm of gnats descended on my car. It was like the Hitchcock film “The Birds,” except they were gnats. So I got out of there before things could get ugly. 😺 #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
I normally get home by the quickest path that will I normally get home by the quickest path that will take me there, but I wasn’t in the mood today to deal with lots of other drivers. So I skipped I-459 and went across the slower two-lane route of Alabama 119. The drive didn’t cure me of all that ails me, but it was a more pleasant and humane experience, at least for me. #nature #naturephotography #trees #countryroad #birmingham #alabama
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This was the sunset behind the restaurant where I This was the sunset behind the restaurant where I hung out to work for awhile this evening. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
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This is what the sky looked like just after sunset This is what the sky looked like just after sunset earlier this evening. I couldn’t decide whether to show you the wider view or the closer view, so you got both. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
I caught the last little bit of light Saturday eve I caught the last little bit of light Saturday even just after the sun had gone beneath the horizon. When you watch something such as this, it’s easy to understand why early humans assumed that the sun revolved around us instead of the other way around. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
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For “throwback Thursday, let me introduce you to For “throwback Thursday, let me introduce you to Sam. In 2009, I took in a young feral cat who I named for the early American revolutionary Samuel Adams. He was one of the most confident — downright arrogant, in fact — cats I’ve ever been around. He had an amazing personality and I immediately loved him. He was no more than 8 or 9 months old when he suddenly died for reasons that my vet couldn’t explain. Even though I had him only a short time, he was one of my all-time favorites. #tbt #cats #tabby #feral #birmingham #alabama
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Thomas believes that he is the Most Interesting Ca Thomas believes that he is the Most Interesting Cat in the World — and I can’t say he’s wrong tonight. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #tabby #tabbycat #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama
Merlin is ready for me to turn the last of the off Merlin is ready for me to turn the last of the office lights off so he and Thomas can sleep peacefully without me muttering to myself as I write. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #merlin2024 #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama
Lucy just finished a Neighborhood Watch patrol and Lucy just finished a Neighborhood Watch patrol and now she’s cooling off in the back yard before heading inside for dinner. Her work is never done. #dog #dogs #dogstagram #dogsofinstagram #cute #cutedog #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #instadog #ilovedogs #birmingham #alabama
Except when he’s asleep, Thomas always looks as Except when he’s asleep, Thomas always looks as though he’s on high alert and ready to run away from danger. His feral early years still dominate his internal programming. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #tabby #tabbycat #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama
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On a live awards show Sunday night, one man made a joke about a female celebrity. The husband of the celebrity was offended and hit the man who made the joke. Or maybe it was staged for entertainment. Who knows? Who cares? Social media is full of discussion — and even arguments — about this idiocy today. This baffles me. Let’s assume for a moment that the event happened as reported. People have been having such idiotic fights ever since there have been humans. Half the bars in the world see such brief dustups regularly. It simply doesn’t matter. The fact that so many people believe they need to talk about this — or even need to have opinions about it — is more evidence of the bizarre media brainwashing that convinces many to care passionately about brain-dead trivia. Your life will be happier and saner if you focus on yourself, your family and your friends, not on whatever scripted (or spontaneous) bilge that the media wants to pipe into your home.

I’m in the middle of migrating this website to new servers this week. This means you might encounter some unexpected behavior until I get all the bugs worked out. Clicking on my links (including this one) might cause your browser to give you the message that it’s a site without a current security certificate. It’s not actually unsafe, but there’s something which isn’t yet set up for the security certificate. I apologize for any such errors you might encounter while the process is going on. If you notice any problems with content which didn’t migrate properly, I would appreciate you letting me know the details at davidmcelroy@mac.com. Thanks for your patience.

I often wonder what animals think when they look at us and consider the society we’ve created. Yes, I know this is fanciful and unrealistic, but what if they could? Would they be astounded at how we treat each other? Would they be disgusted by the ugliness and pettiness which fill so many of our daily interactions? The truth is that I’m feeling pretty disgusted with humanity tonight. I made the mistake of reading some online interactions that I should have avoided — and it sickened me. The people involved appeared to be vile and stupid and arrogant. I wish I could pretend they’re a tiny minority, but I know better. It’s times such as this when I most need to escape much of “civilization” and disconnect from their world. If humans are going to be worthy of “ruling this planet,” we have a lot of growth to do. And I fear that growth is nowhere in sight. So my buddy Thomas, above, and all of his friends would be right to judge us harshly — and to think, “Why do you folks get to be in charge?”

I should have expected this, but I honestly didn’t. The article I wrote last week about disagreements over treatment for autistic children brought me angry emails. You could almost call it “hate mail.” Of the five emails about it so far, two have been to tell me that I’m wrong to even listen to critics of the most popular therapy for autistic children — and the other three tell me I’m wrong for not condemning the treatment as the “obvious” abuse it is. If you read the article, you know I didn’t take a position on the issue, because I simply don’t know enough to have an opinion. But by talking about the issue, I stepped into a heated controversy. The emails from the two sides convinced me of nothing. But they did give me even more empathy for the unfortunate parents who have to figure out for themselves where the truth lies for their children.

Have you ever had what you thought was a new idea — and then discovered that “old you” had the same idea years ago? I had that experience tonight. And it’s been wonderful. I came up with an idea tonight for a very short satirical film that would be a promotion for a fictitious college. The point is to make the college promote — as good things — everything which is actually terrible about most modern colleges. Then I remembered a fake college that I invented back when I was in college. I had created student recruitment brochures and various newsletters back then, so I decided to call my “new” college by the same name I’d invented years ago: Ochita College. As I searched my computer for any old material I might still have about Ochita from the past, I discovered an email I sent to someone in 2009 — outlining essentially the same idea which I came up with tonight. Since I didn’t remember writing that, it felt like magic. So my next film project just might be this one instead. If all goes well, you might soon see “Ochita College: Your Future Starts Here.” This should be fun.

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