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David McElroy

making sense of a dysfunctional culture

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THE McELROY ZOO: Meet Molly, the cat who was ‘returned to sender’

By David McElroy · July 17, 2011

Molly and her sister showed up outside my house — along with their mother — several years ago. I don’t know where they were from, but they were all skittish enough that I assume the mother was a stray. One day, the mother cat disappeared, leaving just two bewildered kittens mewing on my porch.

 The picture on the top of the three to the right is the only one I have of the kittens with their mother, because I couldn’t get close enough to get anything better than this. When she disappeared, I didn’t know what to do, because the kittens wouldn’t even let me get close to them. Unfortunately, it was the time of year that it was starting to get cold outside. (You’ll notice a Halloween pumpkin at the bottom of the picture with their mother.)

I started feeding the kittens quickly, but I really started to get concerned when the mother didn’t return for several days. On the night when it was going to be the first freeze of the season around here, I couldn’t wait any longer. I had to try to catch them.

I’d like to say it was easy, but it was very difficult. I was able to lure them with food. I grabbed one of them while she was eating, but the other took off. (They look so much alike that I don’t know now which I caught first.) After a lot of luring and stealth, I caught the second one, but I ended up bloodied by pretty little teeth and claws.

The two kittens were pretty much identical except for the width of the white strip on their noses. Molly has a wide white vertical strip. Her sister, Bessie, has a narrow vertical strip. They were both small, but their mother was tiny, too. Even as adults, Molly and Bessie weigh only 5 pounds each.

I expected to find homes for them quickly and be out of the business of fostering kittens. After all, I already had enough of my own. I certainly wasn’t going to take it two more.

I started trying to find homes for them, but it was difficult. I’m really picky about what kind of homes I’ll allow animals to go to when I take them in and find homes, because I feel responsible. I was getting desperate, though, and a friend said he knew someone at a vet clinic who had a family looking for a kitten. I thought I’d found a home for one of them. I chose Molly for the new home and went off to meet them.

To be honest, I didn’t like the people. They were well-dressed and lived in a nice neighborhood in a nice house with expensive cars in the driveway. But something about them didn’t feel right. They said the right things, but I had a bad feeling. I should have listened to my gut.

I explained to them that the kittens had come from a stray and that they were very skittish. I said that they’d need a lot of patience and might not ever be lap cats. But they thought Molly was cute, so that was good enough for them.

At this point, I don’t remember how long it was before I heard from the guy. It was at least a couple of weeks, maybe a bit more. He showed up at my door unannounced with a box. They didn’t want Molly. He said she wouldn’t do anything except hide and run from his young daughter. There was something wrong with the cat, he said. She wasn’t “normal.”

I took her back, of course, and she seemed even more skittish than ever. She and her sister seemed happy to see each other and immediately curled up and both of them seemed comforted. They weren’t getting any more friendly. They were still scared of the world. They rarely even let me touch them. I determined that I wasn’t going to split them up again. Since they weren’t the cuddly things that act like typical, happy cats, I realized this meant I was going to have to keep both of them.

What I didn’t realize was that something else happened while Molly was away. I’ll never know the circumstances, but at some point, she was around an unneutered male cat — because I realized that she was pregnant.

Bringing more kittens into a world with too many already was the last thing I wanted to do, but I didn’t have much choice about it. Two years ago, in late June, she gave birth to four kittens. (Three of them survived and still live with me now, but that’s another story.)

Molly is still skittish. She rarely lets me touch her. She’s scared of the world. Hardly anybody else would put up with her or her sister, because they don’t do the typical loving, friendly cat things — ever. But I don’t blame her, because she started out her young life without her mother, without much to eat and without much hope. She’ll never really trust people, but at least she has a safe and loving home.

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

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As far as I know, there were no nuclear devices se As far as I know, there were no nuclear devices set off anywhere near Birmingham this evening, but this cloud formation looked very much like a mushroom cloud rising in the west as I went through downtown Birmingham on I-65 around 6:30 tonight. #nature #naturephotography #sky #clouds #birmingham #alabama
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I didn’t have a lens wide enough to capture this I didn’t have a lens wide enough to capture this with my “real” camera, so this is just an iPhone panorama. It was beautiful to see in person. #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
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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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My favorite photos of Merlin tend to be those — My favorite photos of Merlin tend to be those — such as this one — in which he seems to be contemplating difficult issues. Feline philosophy or quantum physics or something else that he figures I wouldn’t understand. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #merlin2024 #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama #caturday
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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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