Tomorrow lives with Janice and her other 3, Willie, Rosalie, and Bambi.
I first met Tomorrow when I tossed a bag of garbage into the bin by my building, and an orange cat popped out. I ran back in for food, and he was still around the bin, so I was able to put it down and tell him he didn't have to eat garbage any more.
I started to feed him regularly,
and it didn't take long before he trusted me to the point that I had to
stand right beside him, or over him, so he would feel relaxed enough to
eat. If I started to walk away, he would be afraid and leave the food.
I thought he might have some sort of home, because at first he wasn't there
every night. Then he started to appear more regularly, and I made a committment
to be there between 8 and 9 every
evening, no matter where
I had to come home from to get there.
My hope was that he would
become braver with people and I would be able to find him a home.
Each night I would say, "Good Luck, See you Tomorrow", and he just started
to think of that as his name.
I started to be hassled by the management of my building for feeding him, and as he got braver and kind of moved into the lot and on to cars, people started to make some threatening comments, so eventually I felt things were more dangerous for him than they had been when he wouldn't come near anyone, so I just took him in. I tried other names on him, but in his mind, "Tomorrow" was the sound that referred to him, and he liked it!
I have a large screened in
balcony, 12 x 15 feet, and my second bedroom
has a small window that
opens on to it, so I had a place where he could
have lots of room and he
and my old cats could get used to each other safely and slowly. Luckily,
he recognized right away what the litter was for. I took him in to
the vets after a couple days, to be neutered, tattooed, treated with Advantage,
and given shots.
He had only been home from
the vets for a couple days when I went into
his room in the morning
to feed and visit with him, and his head had exploded!!!
Well, I shouldnt be so dramatic
- he apparently had an abscess (from a
fight no doubt) deep in
the tissue just behind and below the ear that
nobody noticed when they
handled him at the vets. There was watery
blood splashed over a large
area on the wall next to where I had made a
bed for him, and he had
a hole and a bare spot high on his neck. I was
shocked at what I saw, but
this tough street cat just looked at me as if to say, in a gravelly voice,
"Whats da matter lady, you never seen a head explode before?"
He and I built a screen door on his room, to move the "getting to know each other" process along, and we relied on that for several months. My Persian is nearly 15 and only about 7 pounds, and I just didn't want this guy to think of him as prey! Now it is quite funny - Tomorrow realizes that Willie is the top cat due his seniority, and if Willie glares at him with his fiercest tiger stare, Tomorrow, who is 15-16 pounds now, scurries under the coffee table!
Thank you, Janice, for sharing Tomorrow's story. Taking in a "street
cat" requires a lot of patience, and the willingness to isolate the newcomer
until he or she gets a clean bill of health. You also
run the risk of finding out the new cat has an incurable disease like FIP,
which would mean having to euthanize your newfound friend. Loving
animals means sometimes your heart breaks, but happy endings like Tomorrow's
remind us that "All God's creatures have a Voice in the Choir" and a place
in our lives.
The Washington, Iowa Humane Society Animal Shelter
is a private, no-kill shelter supported entirely by donations from
people who believe in our cause.
The Shelter receives no funding from the City of Washington
or Washington County. Local Humane Societies do not receive funds
from the national Humane Society (HSUS). Animal Woman maintains
this website to promote adoptions from the local Humane Society and is
solely responsible for the content of those particular pages. Personal
Pages are identified as such.
Please e-mail me at delaney@lisco.net and please come back to visit! Updates are being done all the time.
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