Musing on the unkindest snip of all
The tomcat s face stared accusingly out of ’ his plastic space capsule.
But I was not really looking. We had been building up for this moment, his nightmare ride to his destiny with the blade.
His birthday bells were finally coming off. For the good of all life in the cosmos, and all that responsible bumpf.
I went to extreme lengths to try to get my Covid buddy through the ordeal as quickly as possible.
I had stretched my tech skills and ordered the astronaut model of cat backpack from Takealot, and to cut a lot of the story of the non-delivery to my billet, Gite du Pondok at Avonleigh 50km up a long road from Graaff-Reinet, I had tried my damnedest to integrate the bag into our life in the man-and-cat cave.
For days I only fed him his raw mince treats in the bag, which lay open like a black mussel shell on the couch, and never tried to zip it up with him inside.
But, being half feral, unlike his owner, he smelt a trap. There was no happy-clappy exploration of the new cosy cave, no making it his home-from-home. Nope.
He reached in for his treats with body slung low and as soon as he had scarfed enough of those finely rolled meatball ala-Ferrero Rocher, he was out of there.
I had shopped around, and found a special on neutering in town — the local SPCA was on its knees financially and unable to help a penniless hack — and the day before our booking at the GraaffReinet Veterinary Clinic, I was churning inside. This was not how it was planned. No lovely 100m rides in the backpack with treats at every turn. No conditioning to render the pack a happy place filled with the intoxicating smell, of meat, no scenic cat TV.
Would he survive or just die from shock when I started Delores, the best bike ever to be crafted by human hands, but who sounds as rough as a bear s arse, as my ’ dad liked to say?
That night, was nil per mouse, as I translated the very nice lady s instructions ’ at the vets No water, no food ”. “
My little guy has only to step through his cat door and he is in the great outdoors, where his mousinator rate is easily three of the poor creatures a night, or 1,113 a year, 17,000 in a lifetime. As the sun dropped behind Toorberg, I closed all his exits, prepared my kit for the dawn ride, removed all food and water, and hunkered down for the long night.
Even took a black koki to the backpack and engraved “The Little Baron, c/o Delores Koan ”.
He hardly ever mews, and soon enough, there was a quizzical little squeak. Then it got real crazy. After patrolling the pondok, he leapt onto the soft blankey and started smurgling (kneading) as if to draw water from the dry fibre. His haunches, even at six weeks, have bulked up and he tore into the blankey with front and back claws until I could take no more. I felt my throat and tongue clench, and I felt parched and desperate.
I leapt out of the tent, poured him 150ml of water, gave him 10 pellets of dry food and slaked my thirst with glasses of water. He schlurped and crunched it down and seemed to accept his fate. Finally, we fell asleep to the calming sounds of the animalspecific orchestral piece, Katey Moss Catwalk by David Teie, ya, cat music.
By dawn I was up, scrubbed and cloaked in my motorcycle armour. Put a stinky meshirt in the pack and a little cow-shaped hot waterbottle. The path was cleared for cat in a backpack, to the bike to the vet. I was locked in. Eyes wide shut.
I broke the rules and lured him to the pack with a miserly smidgen of vleis. He was so bok, he stood to attention on my lap as I clipped his harness around his neck and waist. That was a first. He would do it, but never with such determination and focus.
As he went into the pack headfirst for the bait, I grabbed his ass and shoved him in while pulling up the sides. He froze in a silent squawk but it was too late to apply rear brakes properly. I got those claws free from the edge of the pack and it was all over.
I zipped him, loaded him on my back, fired up Delores and beat it out of there.
Silence. No movement. Just the rattle and clunk of a mighty KLR ambulance.
I cursed the farm gates but we got through and onto the icy glowing plains of the Camdeboo.
Felt like a parent taking a child for surgery: all you have to do is not drop the bike, I incanted. Not now.
I got into town with no signs of struggle or life from my back. I stopped, lost, and took out my phone looking for the vet s
’ street address. I was parked right outside. Small mercies.
Inside the beautiful green-and-white immaculate Karoo huisie the vet himself appeared.
Roland Larson was everything I believe South African vets to be. A busy, gruff, kindly oke. I was the first in line, and he matterof-factly removed the backpack with little baron Leigh van Avon of Avonleigh from my grip and they marched off down the passage. Over his shoulder, he asked for the cat s name and when I started rattling off ’ his title, said, something like, whateva, and disappeared.
Be back by 12 or earlier he said. The cat was going to be fine. And that was it. Done!
I did my shopping, loaded Delores and fell into a stress-relief brekkie at Die Kliphuis until the phone rang. Come get your cat.
At the counter, an assistant handed me back the astronaut pack. The little baron was slumped happily in the bottom, drugged and zizzing.
Roland appeared briefly and I was able to get in a few journalistic questions. No he did no fancy cauterisation, he just made a small cut, showing me a gap in his fingers, and the rest was history.
Once again we rode. No movement, but there was joy in my step when I threw open the doors to home, lifted kittybooi off my back and opened it up on the floor.
He staggered out, sat on the ground, and promptly licked his wounds. When I tried to stroke his ears, he brought his white socked back legs up into a little protective ball.
He looked bedonnered. I was going to pay, I thought.
He went out, rolled in the dust, and ran away.
Then the hard-hat called. The Dispatch needed a splash on the terrifying unemployment figures of 52.8% and I was on the schizophrenic laptop and hammered away from lunchtime to sunset.
The touch of a tail feather on my ankles, the little booi s trademark greeting. He is ’ back!
No amount of tempting would get him to eat a morsel. He was woozy but coming round.
We got into that tent and by morning he was up at my face looking at me and inquiring, hey you, human scratchpole, what the hell happened?
I had a sneak at Roland s handiwork, ’ such a neat little line, I could weep.