Bess

A gentle nod to a fierce predatory creature with which I share my home

Bess

“Oh my stars! What’s wrong with your cat?”

I hear this a lot when people meet Bess.

Bess has a condition called "cerebellar hypoplasia". While most cat owners become convinced over time that their pet has part of its brain missing, mine actually does. Her mom was a feral queen, unvaccinated, and contracted a virus, known in lay terms as distemper, during the critical stage of brain development while carrying her litter. The virus wiped out a crucial part of the developing kittens' brains. As a result, Bess was born missing her balance center, the cerebellum.

To live with this condition, she has had to kind of compensate.  She had to be taught what other kittens do by instinct- walking, using the litter box, standing, eating, etc. Her neurons fire differently than other kitties’. She doesn’t think the same, feel the same, or walk the same. She walks like she’s drunk, and she holds her legs at an exaggerated angle. She uses the entire hind leg, from the paw to the kneee, as a plantar surface, kind of like a rabbit. She is unsteady on her feet. She… wobbles, like Jell-o. She cannot jump really well, so Bess actually scales furniture like the world’s smallest rock climber, hooking her claws into the fabric and climbing hand over hand until she struggles to the top. She is the only cat I know that thumps instead of slinking up stairways. She occasionally walks into walls and falls down stairs.

I felt sorry for her for about one week, after bringing her home to be Porgy’s mate (Porgy and Bess- of course!). That was until the day I watched her in the living room, teaching herself how to jump. The concentration she displayed was uncannily human. It was no less than that of a child determined that he was going to overcome some embarassing lack of ability, and he wasn’t going to give up until he got it perfect. She worked on jumping for two solid hours until she nailed it. I’ve never seen any other cat concentrate for two hours on anything before except maybe sleeping. Even laser pointers get dull after a while. So, I refuse to help her with much around the house, in order to preserve her considerable dignity. Instead, I rearrange furniture, hoping she doesn’t notice I am trying to make things a little easier. There is only so much a mom can do, and so much she can hold back.

I can never be sure how she perceives the world. Her brain had to lay down new working pathways in unusual configurations to compensate for her dysfunction. It is very possible that these improvised pathways connect parts that normally would have nothing to do with each other. Watching her, in fact, I am convinced this is true.  I think for example, that she perhaps tastes what she sees, and feels whatever it is she hears. When she walks, I imagine that she is really smelling the changing surfaces of the floors as her tiny velvet black paws pad across them. Perhaps she is actually a phenomenally gifted poet, trapped in the five-pound body of a crippled cat?

Of course, it is easy to dismiss the fact that she is still a little predatory animal. This is probably a sin, but I laugh until I cry watching Bess on her relentless hunt to seek and destroy all resident moths in my home. She usually misses as she makes a sort-of-running leap and swats just to the left of where they are flying. However, this is Bess- she keeps at it until she doesn’t miss. She doesn’t waste anything, promptly consuming all she catches with loud, smacking sounds emanating from her lips. She is polite- unlike Porgy with his mice, she does not vomit little half-digested moth carcasses all over my floors for me to scrape away dutifully before work. Good kitty, indeed.

For all that is askew in this little creature’s body, there are many things that are simply perfect. She is one the gentlest animals I have ever met. As stated before, she must climb the furniture to get on it. She does this for the sheer joy of being close to a person. As one friend pointed out, “It is hard not to love something that puts forth this much effort just to be with you.” To enable her to scale obstacles, I do not trim her claws, and they are sharp as honed daggers. Before she begins climbing, or jumps to a spot she can reach, she always judges the distance from her claws to my body. If I am too close, she will signal me to move. I think she truly feels sorry when she accidentally hurts someone. When climbing, and she reaches the edge, she tentatively reaches out to make sure she won't hook me before she makes the final push to the top.

This cat is also an empath. I awaken every morning with her tucked neatly into the crook of my arm, gently licking my inner wrist with tiny, unobtrusive flicks of her tongue and cradling her head perfectly in my cupped hand. She stays like this until I have remembered my dreams, and only then jumps down to demand her breakfast. If I am on the phone with someone who is hurting, her reaction is astounding- she climbs into my lap, and cries until I let her sniff, and nuzzle the phone. The more lost the person, the more insistent her attention. Again, I think that the pain of others perhaps becomes a visible thing to her, because of her unique condition. I imagine she sees an aura of distress and feels compelled to comfort it.

This gentle little creature is a holy terror to other cats. Since she turned 18 months old, she has been the dominant force in my house, and that is including my own person. There’s something wryly amusing about watching my encumbered black demon chase perfectly able-bodied felines up the stairs and into hiding.  On wooden floors and steps, she sounds like a miniature herd of hoofed mammals- the world’s smallest wildebeest stampede. I cannot help but laugh outrageously at her. Luckily, she forgives my mirth. Once the danger to me of the other cat has been vanquished to exile in the top shelves of a hall closet, she comes running back to me, as if to say, “Look mom, I protected you” while rolling over to show me her soft furry belly. Like a puppy, she writhes under my attention and caresses, licking my hand. Life is good.

Yep, my cat is different. Destroyer of moths, vanquisher of feline menaces, midwife to my dreams, and consoler of those in need of solace. Poet Laureate of my household. Five pounds of brain-damaged wonder. Learned pupil of the Ministry of Silly Walks. Like the Harlequin in Ellison’s classic story, she seems condemned to view her entire world, and everything in it, just a tiny bit slantwise. I can totally relate to what that is like.

There is nothing actually "wrong" with my cat.




 

Author's Note

This is the true depiction of a crippled cat I adopted in 2005.

As of today, 7/7/13, she appears to be entering the final days of her life. She has been painlessly riddled with tumors for a few years, and now they have started interfering with her ability to eat an drink. Words cannot describe how much this tiny creature will be missed.

Update: Bess gave up the fight today, 7/8/13. Her "dad" held her through her final minutes, and she was buried on the property, out in a beautiful spot where her disability never let her wander. She leaves behind a hole that we will never be able to completely fill.

This story was published in 2012 in the anthology, "Animal Tails," available on Amazon. You can find the link on my profile page.

Reviews

[fauxcajun]

I am so impressed with this / I am impressed with your wonderful, wonderful cat / I am impressed with your fantastic ability to write this piece which took me on so many different emotional jaunts / I have fallen in love with Bess, and I am a dog lover / I like cats, but I am a dog lover / However, I love Bess / Bless the circumstances that allowed this special feline to not be shoved aside as worthless and "damaged" before you got to her / I am not all that big on these warm and fuzzy stories, however, in this particular case I had a lump in my throat a couple of times as I read about Bess, the cat / Thank you for giving it to us to read . . .

[bob, small b. aka invs]

a nice tribute. bess sounds like a wonderful creature. you're lucky to have each other.

[Shutterbug]

This is a great story. I can see why you love her so much. She is a charactor really takes charge even though she is different. But you have to realize that she doesn't know any differnt. She is who she is.

Thanks for sharing :)

[Ama May Cooper]

I love bess, Her as a cat and her as a story beautifully woven, a creative and gentle peace.. thank you very much for submitting this if not following the guidlines of the contest competely i think ill make an acception for this beautiful piece of work x

[Jess]

It sounds like she might have synaesthesia! http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/92698.php

Bess also has the softest fur I've ever felt, and she puts it to use when she snuggles up on the futon with visitors :)

[Through the Gateway]

That's fantastic! Not only is this piece well written, but Bess deserves her own pedestal to stand upon. We could all learn a lesson from her, I think.

[Raef C. Boylan]

It's so rare to find a well-written piece on here regarding the author's pet(s). Yours is excellent; affectionate without being sickly and descriptive enough for us to feel that we've actually met Bess.
If I thought I'd get a cat like this - an empathetic one - I might actually consider it for the future, despite being a dog-person/pets-that-don't-moult-person. However, I'm pretty sure that any cat I'd end up with would ultimately be some kind of fiend from hell that would hide itself in places like cupboards, solely to jump out and attempt to claw my face off.
Cats scare me.

Great writing. Glad I stopped by here.

[SR Urie]

Hi Marie.
Like you I too am a cat lover. As just another person in the cat's staff you belong to her, whether your human intellect has been able to figure that out or not. Great write, ma'am. BZ

[W.k.kortas]

Bess, you is my woman now...this is clean, well-organized, and nicely pitched. This piece could have very easily descended into Marley-'N-Me issue saccharrine sappiness, but it maintains a prudent amount of detachment. It's heartwarming, but without threatening to clog the arteries. Clean, well-built writing which strikes just the right tone.