Why Life Is The Cat’s Whiskers
SongsofPraise presenter Pam Rhodes is kept busy writing, running a cattery and caring for RSPCA rescue cases…
It’s supposed to be cats who require nine lives, but Pam Rhodes nearly ended up needing an extra one herself after one of her favourite felines wrapped itself around her legs, landing her in hospital with a shoulder fractured in five places.
Away from television, kind-hearted Pam has a boarding cattery at her home, where she looks after a mixture of RSPCA kittens and local cats whose owners are away on holiday. However, the cat responsible for Pam’s downfall was actually her own Burmese, Pickle.
“We’d just had a lovely great big roast dinner. I was putting all the scraps down and one of the cats got so excited that it wrapped round my leg and I ended up with no feet on the floor,” she recalls.
“My shoulder was broken in five places – it was all a bit dramatic. I had to have an operation to pin it back together.”
Pam, who has just published her 12th novel entitled SpringtimeAtHope Hall, runs the Bedfordshire cattery with her husband Richard and caters for up to 35 moggies at a time.
She says, “We have a core of RSPCA waifs and strays from the local branch, so we’ve several cats who are looking for homes. Sometimes we’ll have three adopted in a week and then we can go for six weeks and none of them finds a home.
“We’ve had occasions when suddenly 22 cats have arrived from the RSPCA, because they’ve just been rescued. All of life is there really. First, you hear about the tragic story and sometimes the cruelty – cats being thrown out of moving cars, or being left sealed in boxes. But on the other side of it are the lovely people who will take on animals that are older or really needy.
“We end up with the ones no one else wants, which means we’ve got three real oddball cats. One called
“We end up with the ones no one wants so we’ve got three real oddball cats”
Maddie lives in the barn and I’ve never touched her in eight years. She came in as an RSPCA cat and was absolutely terrified of humans, having had a really bad time, so I’ll never ever be able to cuddle her or stroke her. It breaks your heart. Her trust in people has been shattered, and whatever I do that will never change.”
Pam and her husband opened the cattery after they married 16 years ago. “My husband has lived on a two-acre smallholding for 35 years and in one of the big old barns there had been a cattery,” Pam (69) explains.
“It was closed when I met him and he suggested we open it again. I knew nothing about the subject, but I’ve been running it ever since. My husband is a roofing contractor, so it’s definitely my department!
“I’m very fond of cats, they’re great company and it’s a very rewarding job. We are so thrilled when one of our residents finally finds someone to take them on.”
It’s perhaps not surprising that Pam cares so much for the cats in her charge. Her day job hosting the popular Sunday evening programme SongsOfPraise regularly shows her empathetic side, as she chats to people from all walks of life – from the bereaved to the famous, including the Pope, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Prince Charles and even
Dolly Parton.
She also finds time for charity work – she is vice president of The Leprosy Mission and has just returned from a fund-raising trip to
Bangladesh. At the same time she has her own radio programme and is a successful author, having written 24 books to date.
Yet despite celebrating her 70th birthday later this year,
Pam has no plans to retire.
“I think I’d be bored to tears if I stopped working and writing. I like to have lots on my mind, so I can’t see any reason to slow down really.”
Away from work, she enjoys a happy home life, with eight children and countless grandchildren. Not surprisingly the house is always full of the sound of laughter and chatter, but as much as she loves the hustle and bustle she admits she has to flee the country in order to write her novels.
“I got married to a man with six daughters, who are all grown-up now. I have a son and daughter of my own so I’m the mother of many and Nanny Pammy to about 10 grandchildren,” she smiles.
“I’ve just rung home and three of the daughters are
there and gaggles of children. The house is always full, which is lovely, but it does make it difficult to write!”
Luckily Pam’s sister has an apartment in Spain, so every February and October Pam flies out there and sets to work.
“I get up at six in the morning and write and write and write,” she says.
“I write quite fast and in four weeks the book is written. I get quite absorbed and really do join that world for a month. When I’m in the middle of writing a novel I don’t even know what day it is!”