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Chapter 34. Isabelle and Joanne -- Indulgent Mother; Spoiled Daughter
"Hey, lady, look what we got!"
The two little boys ran up to me excitedly as I put down some cat food in the junk lot on 109th Street.
One of the boys cupped a tiny, flea bitten kitten in his hands. "Oh my!" I exclaimed. "The kitten is very cute, but he is so tiny! He should still be with his mother. Where did you get him?" I asked the boys who appeared to be around nine-years-old.
"Up the block," one of the boys answered, pointing to the corner bodega. "The store is givin' 'em away." "Well, unfortunately, the kittens are too small and sickly to be given away yet. You see this?" I said, pointing out the fleas to the young boys. "They are fleas. They suck the blood from animals and the kitten could die. Your mom isn't going to let you come home with a sick kitten. The kitten needs to get medicine to get rid of the fleas."
After a few minutes of talking with the boys, they agreed to give me the kitten they had gotten from the store. I then went up the corner bodega and asked to speak with the owner. "These kittens are too young to be giving away to neighborhood kids," I told the middle-aged Latino gentleman behind the counter. "They have fleas and need medical care. I run a rescue group and would be happy to take them from you."
"Ah, good!" said the owner of the store. "If you wait a meenute, I bring you the mother cat and another cat too! Wait outside and I have one of the guys bring 'em up to you."
I waited outside the bodega and one of the workers opened the doors to the cellar below. The musty smell wifting up from the opened basement door was enough to knock a person out. It smelled of tom cat urine, dirt and multiple animals.
After a few minutes, a young man appeared with two cardboard boxes. In one of the boxes was the scrawny mother cat and her four flea-ravaged kittens. In the other box was a young, adult female cat, who looked very much like the mother of the skinny kittens. I placed the kitten in my hand into the box with his mother and siblings. I then noticed a skinny and filthy white cat at the bottom of the basement stairs. "What about that one?" I asked the bodega worker. "Ah, naw, you can't take heem, " the man answered in a heavy Spanish accent. "We need 'eem for the mice."
Well, I already had enough cats to worry about. I would have to remember that one for another day.
Upon returning to my apartment on East 95th Street, I placed the mother, her kittens and grown up daughter from a previous litter in the bathroom. As the kittens were too young for flea baths or heavy chemicals, I doused each one with flea powder and then placed them on a large white towel. I also doused the mother and teenage daughter with flea powder.
The mother and grown up daughter were very friendly and social cats, giving me hope that once spayed and vetted, they would be fairly easy adoptions.
When I went back to the kittens wrapped up in a towel, I was horrified to see the white towel covered in bright red blood. The fleas had been sucking the life out of the tiny kittens!
Meanwhile, the grown up adult daughter was sucking milk from the skinny mother! "Oh no!" I said, trying to move her away. "Mom needs her milk for the kittens!"
I named the mother cat, "Isabelle" and her plump, BI-tabby daughter, "Joanne." But, I could not believe the mother cat allowing the grown up daughter to nurse on her! I moved the spoiled daughter away and placed the tiny kittens at their mother's teats. Thankfully, they all began to nurse vigorously.
Over the weeks that followed, the kittens thrived, now having been ridded of their fleas. Both mother and "Aunt" cared for them well, Joanne mainly playing with and occasionally licking them, while mother Isabelle fed and cleaned them. Once vetted, the well socialized, adorable and healthy kittens were easy adoptions at Pet Stop.
But, Isabelle and her spoiled, but devoted daughter, Joanne were a different story.
Joanne, from a continuous supply of mother's milk, was now bigger than the mother and quite fat. Even after spaying of both cats, Joanne still continued to "nurse," and Isabelle welcomed her fat "kitten's" needs as if Joanne were a newborn. The two were inseparable.
Joanne had a kind of feisty, spoiled personality, while mama Isabelle was extremely gentle, affectionate and patient to all around her. Isabelle would have been a wonderful cat for a family with children, but her daughter was not one to put up with "competition" for long. Joanne wanted Mama's attention all to herself. She was reasonable friendly to people, but her real heart was for her mother. The two cats had to be placed together.
It took many weeks of showing the two cats at Pet Stop, before, finally, a wonderful young married couple adopted the two cats together. It was indeed a day of personal celebration for me! The adopters would continue to amuse us with stories of Isabelle and spoiled daughter, Joanne for the remaining time we were at Pet Stop.
Meanwhile, there was the matter of the dirty, skinny white cat still at the Bodega on 109th Street. And it wouldn't be long before I would encounter him again on the streets of East Harlem.