Life on the Edge
In August, 1999, we found the nest in the loft. At that time we had just stopped running cattle and the barn was still full of hay. Several half-wild cats who earned their keep herding barn mice lived there and did their best to hide themselves and their litters from toms, coons, skunks, and us. In the bowl-shaped depression in the hay lay two kittens, not two weeks old, motionless, one dead, one dying, its eyes barely open, clearly abandoned. Late summer kittens rarely do well, often left by mothers who perhaps cannot find mice or other game enough to feed a litter, perhaps driven off by stifling loft temperatures. Deb took the still alive one back to the cooler house and with a syringe began force feeding KMR every hour. I set up a terrycloth surrogate mother in a cage to comfort and protect it from predators between feedings.
Against odds, the kitten revived and was soon sucking on a bottle.
Within a few weeks, it started exploring its new home as if it had never been so close to the edge.
We named him Bo Jangles.
Lily and Buddy were a little skeptical at first but soon tolerated the addition.
While they never got as close as they were to each other--they were litter mates, after all--Bo was certainly related, since at that time, all the cats on the place were descendants of the Ur-mother, Mousetrap. And Bo was pushy.
He soon saw himself as king of the house, a position that Buddy did not exactly agree with.
They often vied for high spot on the mailbox scratching post but when Bud wasn't looking, Bo took over.
Once, Deb brought Bogie, our Neapolitan Mastiff puppy, 80 or 90 pounds or so of muscle, to the living room past the mailbox where Bo was surveying his domain.
Without hesitation, Bo leapt, claws out, to prove control. Poor unsuspecting Bogie about turned inside out to escape to the kitchen and the yard. I'm not sure he ever saw the monster riding his back. As Bo grew older, he grew even more dominant, although he tolerated Buddy and Lily as old-time residents.
He enjoyed sleeping on Mother's lap when she was still with us, but like teenagers generally, Bo wanted little to do with Deb, even though Deb had saved his life and was pretty much the only mother he ever knew--except for the terrycloth surrogate. He would sometimes climb on my lap but it was rare enough that Deb snapped his photo.
Later in life, his standoffish attitude mellowed. When he heard a car in the driveway, he sat in front of the door waiting for whoever was arriving, and followed into the kitchen demanding food. If I was in my office and he wanted attention, he walked in and put claws in my leg so I petted him. Sometimes he was content to sleep on the floor next to my chair, other times he kept after me until I walked to the kitchen and fed him.
When Deb brought Vader home, Bo beat him up and kept him terrorized, although eventually they reached an accommodation of sorts.
As he aged, Bo developed arthritis in his paws and began walking on his wrists. For a while, he could still jump up but it was painful to jump down so we put a box next to the bed to ease the climb down.
In July of this year, I found him in distress, unable to lift his head. His vet diagnosed potassium deficiency, a classic presentation, and feared he would not last the night. An IV drip was started, and in two days, we brought him home, not quite as lively as a kitten, but still himself. We had gotten Annie, a Cane Corso Mastiff, and Deb wanted her house trained.
The first time Deb brought her inside, she weighed perhaps 30 pounds. Bo no longer climbed on the mailbox, but that didn't slow him. The moment he saw Annie, he jumped in her face, landed several blows to her nose before the puppy knew what happened; she was convinced: she would not walk past Bo unless one of us stood between her and the cat. When Bo lay on the rug on the way to the kitchen, Annie stayed on her doggie bed in the living room.
Then the cancer got worse, potassium levels plummeted. We brought him home from the hospital and stayed with him through the day. At first he acknowledged our presence, then toward evening he could no longer raise his head. Sharon Blouin, Bo's vet, came to the house to help. At about 7 p.m., Bo quietly slipped over the edge. We buried him in the flower garden near Lily and Buddy. In the spring, we'll plant flowers.
Bo Jangles
August 1, 1999--December 3, 2014
Requiescat in Pace
