Surprise, Surprise.

So tomorrow morning at 6 am, Sean leaves to take Mister to Radiocat in Greenville.  I'm holding up okay, but I have to admit that most of my day was filled with fantasies of carrying Mister around the house, petting him until he hissed, and sleeping with him in the guest room.  I pictured myself eating with him, reading with him, and spending lots and lots of time with him.

Funny how sometimes the Universe just says:  "Nah...not gonna happen."  

I was five minutes from home when I got "the call."  Sean seemed to be returning my call from earlier, and I was happy to hear his ring tone on my phone.  When I answered the phone, however, things went South very quickly.  

"Where are you?" said Sean.

"I'm five minutes from the house...why?" I answered, suspicious.  "Are you okay?"  

"I've been better," he basically said.  

Oh crap.  The last time Sean sounded like this, he'd put a hatchet in his leg.  Hello, Emergency Room.


"WHAT happened?!"  


"I've caught what seems to be a sick kitten in the yard.  Can you call one of your contacts at Animal Compassion Network?"  


First, from me, a sigh of relief that Sean and all our kitties were okay, then, after a beat:


Oh CRAP.

This is not how I wanted this night to go.  This was supposed to be Mister's and my night--full of cuddling and carrying and purring--not rushing a sick kitten to the Emergency Room.  But, we had no choice.  Sean had the cat in a carrier and when I finally got there, it did look a little sick.  Greenish discharge from the nose...one eye slowly slipping shut.  Either it was sick or it had experienced some kind of trauma, but either way, something had to be done.  
   
Called ACN--couldn't help us.  Called Brother Wolf (another no-kill shelter in the area)--had to leave a message.  This poor cat had the misfortune of being found during peak "kitten season," which meant that there were no rooms in the inn (so to speak).  

So, we schlepped the kitten over to Brother Wolf, who was still open until 8:00pm.  They still couldn't take the kitten.  But what happened there was magical, and truly a shining example of taking a leap of faith and expecting there to be a happy cloud to land on.  It was a night of community and solidarity and animal people coming together to help a small critter in need, but right now, it is almost midnight and I still need to get in some Mister-cuddling, so the rest of the story will just have to wait until tomorrow.  There was an ER visit, sort of, but luckily it had nothing to do with my husband putting a yard tool into his leg.


(to be continued...)