Senorita Jakita Clarifies A Thing or Two About Momma

As you can well imagine, with a father who stuffed Momma’s full of stories of the animal kingdom, she and all of her siblings would have a passion for pets.  It still is hard for them to go to a Pet Store or even worse, the SPCA and see those little critters, in pens, like jail cells, not understanding why they are captured, their eyes begging to be rescued. Still today, the family can not watch SPCA Advertisements or Reality Pet Rescues, or they sit and weep. The problem is, they have so many pets at home already, it defies logic to take in another mouth to feed, more vet bills and four more paws to clean up after. Listen to the tale of why Momma has irrefutable proof that befriending strays is part of her complicated DNA.

One day, Momma walked in to her kitchen and saw five of our six cats, sitting on the kitchen table, napping in the sunlight, (it was before my time – they would not get away with that behavior if I had been there). Suddenly, Momma remembered something from her childhood, so many years ago. She saw her present unravel as her mind traveled back to a journey in her youth.  It occurred to poor Momma, that she had turned in to her father’s old maid cousin who had more cats than, well: ‘There was an old woman who lived in the shoe, She had so many children (see cat – interchangeable), she didn’t know what to do.’

Once a year, on a summer Sunday afternoon, all of Momma’s family would pile in the car and travel down the coast to see their dear spinster cousin.  The whole way down, my Grandmother-God-Rest-Her-Clean-Soul warned, that they would not even accept a cup of tea from that woman because her house was so filthy from the flea-bitten cats that covered her every table, couch, beds or any other surface, that suited their purposes.

As the family trooped into the house, they caught the unmistakable smell that comes from male cats marking their territory.  Cousin Sally would be so happy to see them, so grateful to be actually interacting with humans, that it made them feel mean-spirited to refuse her bland refreshments. All of the children, for once sat in silence, thankfully letting the adults carry the conversation, in order to avoid breathing in the foul, stale air that permeated the house.

Momma tells me she has no idea what happened to all those cats when Cousin Sally joined the Family Circle in the Sky.  As the old folks would say, ‘Blood is thicker than Water’ and, Momma, being  like her father before her,  has never learned the ‘Just-Say-No’ when it comes to strays. The more beaten up and woe-be-gone it is, the more Momma loves it.

Who am I to stand in judgement of Momma?  Still, I keep practicing my most annoying, loud big girl woof to get the feral felines, the heck out of Jakitaville. Cats, I have noticed hate incessant barking (accept the crew that were already on-board when I made this my Forever Home – they just walk up and bat me in the face with their clawed paw, which roughly translates to ‘shut-uppa-your-face’ and I do, but not without first tattling on them to Momma.

You tell me. Has Momma been blessed or cursed with the genes of her father and her  Spinster Cousin Sally, Once-Removed?