Good Samaritan

CHICO

It was an incredibly sad morning for me.

For years I've been feeding Morgan (Captain - named for being blind in one eye) and Milly, his sidekick, on Short Street.  I built a very nice shelter there, with some beautiful wooden huts and such and this is how they have survived this brutal winter.Both are black cats with white - tuxies I guess you would call them.  Both wait for me on top of the snow piles each morning.  They keep their distance, but know me, and know I am there to feed them. Neither were there this morning.  I didn't think anything of it, as its common for them not to be around.

As I pulled out the wet towel from the shelter to place a dry one down, to then place the food and water down for them, I noticed a cat not moving inside one of the shelters inside.  I crawled inside with a towel in hand and pulled out Morgan.  Dead.  My poor baby Morgan.  I noticed blood and such on his fur.  The only thing I can think of is that he was hit by a car and crawled his way inside and died there.  I wrapped him in a towel, placed him in the car, and as I drove off, I saw Milly in the distance watching me.  Poor Milly.

As I went to the next seven more spots after that, finishing up the sixth I drove to the last on Central.  I did my usual finagling trying to walk to the shelter, got down on my knees to refill the bowls and heard a cry.  I looked inside and there was Chico, inside a styrofoam container, and he looked like he couldn't move.  I then realized something was wrong with him, and I quickly began to try to pull the hut out from under the huge mound of snow covering the board and tarp to make up this little village underneath for the homeless cats.  With herculean effort, I managed to get the entire styrofoam box out from under and carried it to the car, and drove off immediately to the emergency clinic 10 miles away.  The box couldn't have weighed more than a pound.  And neither did Chico.  He was a skeleton.

Chico - and his home (box)

I got to the clinic and had him assessed, and after being told that he had major trauma, didn't weigh more than three pounds, if that, severely dehydrated, broken teeth, blood coming out of his nose (they said it looked like he was hit by a car), I agreed to euthanization, which was what they suggested.  He was very still anyways, as I sat petting him and talking to him (and crying), I had to keep checking to see if he was alive.   Heart break.  He must have been in there for days/weeks - starving and injured.  He was next on my list but I hadn't seen him around for a while.  True heart break.  They offered to take Morgan and cremate him also.

I drove off with a heavy heart.

To top that off, I got into work with the head honcho asking me to come talk to him.  He then told me that I wasn't losing my job but I would be reporting to another person in another department of the hospital. I sat there numb, said thank you and walked away.  Am I happy?  No.  Did this just make me more miserable than I already am with my 'career'?  Yes.  I have been through too many changes since I started working at my beloved hospital, where I was born.  All I can do is be thankful for getting a paycheck. I would be lost in life without it.

I am not certain why some people have jobs/careers that they love, while others suffer in silence.  Is it fate?  Circumstance?  No. For some its luck, but mostly its all how you apply yourself from school age on.  I chose to pursue other things in life, when I should have been pursuing different things.  I made wrong decisions.  And I now pay the price for that.  So, take heed young people, go to school, study for something you love.  You will regret it otherwise.

Have a good day everyone.