|
 |
|
| Name: |
Opie
|
Age: |
Fifteen years old
|
| Gender: |
Male
|
Kind: |
Orange Tabby mix
|
| Home: |
New York, New York, USA
|
Opie was rescued in March 2002 by a friend who had two large dogs. She called to tell me that she had him in her bathroom to protect him from the dogs, clearly trying to get me interested in adoption. My previous cat, the last of a litter that I had rescued the day they were born, 18 years before, had died just two months earlier, and I was just getting ready to look through the shelters for one or two cats. When my friend called and told me she found this skinny orange and white cat, I said I wasn't ready.
When she called the next day to say she had a two o'clock vet appointment with him, I thought, Well, it can't hurt just to look. When I saw this face peeking through the net of the Sherpa bag she had him in, I thought, He's Opie—the little red-headed boy from the Andy Griffith show. He named himself and he was mine. The Vet said, "These orange boys are special." Well, he was special in a lot of ways. He was allergic to regular cat food, so has been on an allergy diet his whole life. In addition to the problems he had when found (swollen eye, bad cough, infected tail), he developed strange, new symptoms with alarming regularity.
But, with lots of TLC and a positive mental attitude —his, not mine— he developed into the lovable boy you see here. These pictures were taken recently, after he had surgery for a lesion on his side (undiagnosed) and the extraction of seven teeth (he had already had four pulled earlier in life). I threw a sweater over him to distract him from licking at his stitches, and he loved the sweater so much that it's now his. In spite of all his medical issues over the years, coupled with his tendency to fly over my head in the middle of the night, while chattering non-stop, I feel very fortunate to have had him in my life for so long, and I look forward to more years to come. Given his precarious start and the struggles he's overcome (and though I know it would make him even more impossible to live with!), he and I would be honored and thrilled to see him spotlighted.
|
|
|
|
|
