ranton

Many of us have have been blessed with pets in our lives has a gift, a stray or a neighbor's. These are two pets I did not own, have any idea where they came from or what happened to them.

The first was a cat I called Shadow, I met the feline (sex unknown) in the parking lot of an apartment complex. After several meetings in passing, I set a food dish outside in the parking lot. This led to Shadow following me to my apartment, I left the door open and after several days Shadow came inside. The door was never closed but Shadow got to the point of sitting on the couch next to me allowing me brushing and petting privileges. This relationship lasted 3 or 4 months and ended when Shadow no longer came around.

The second was a lizard that lived off the back balcony of the Bellman's Quarters at a resort. Two skills where required to become friendly with this lizard, you had to swat flies without killing them and you had to be able to hold them in your finger tips for the lizard. There where eleven Bellman and only four of us had the dexterity to be able to accomplish these skills.

Since the resort had plenty of swamp the flies where no problem to find. Once one was captured and ready to be fed to the Lizard (we never named him) all it took was a few knocks on the handrail and the Lizard can scurrying for his free meal. If the fly was not moving, the meal was rejected, otherwise it would be taken right out of our finger tips.

We had contest to see who could feed the Lizard the most flies in a shift, the little thing fattened up quite nicely. After two seasons, he was gone.

Eweser

We had a dog once that showed up with it's sibling. We managed to give her sibling away, but my husband's grandson loved the female (she looked like a Lab; her brother a pointer) so we kept her and he named her Shadow. While we had her, which was probably about a year, she managed to get run over, healed up, give us a litter of puppies we didn't expect, that we did manage to give them all away, and then disappeared. Our guess is someone picked her up. She was a sweet, beautiful dog. I just hope she's in a happy home with lots of children now.

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"Whoever wrote this episode should die!"

Grancey

When I was 5 years old I befriended a squirrel. I would sit on the back steps of our home and feed the squirrel pecans out of my hand. That summer our family moved to a new house, and as I feared for the loss of my "pet" squirrel my mother reassured me that he would be alright and might find me at our new home. Diligently, I set out bowls of nuts in hopes that my squirrel would find me. Alas, my friend never appeared, but a lifetime of dedication to my pets and concern for wildlife had begun.

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Quiet, mild-mannered souls might just turn out to be roaring lions of two-fisted cool.

Willravel

About 3 years back I was having a garage sale and an adult tuxedo cat with opposable thumbs (polydactyl cat) came along and gave me amazing allergies. If anything, I could say that this cat was rare, but I thought "Nah, foget it. *ACHOO* there's dander in the air!". After I took a Benadryl, I came back out and inspected him, only to find that while he was clean he was malnourished. Against my better judgment, I brought out some fresh, raw tuna and a saucer of pasteurized skim milk. I decided to call him Scat, because that's what I had said when he first appeared. After eating, he snuggled at my feet and slept for a few hours, and when the garage sale was done he moved on (which I understand is odd for a cat, as a cat normally would have stayed where he could get food).

A few months after Scat moved on, I bought a beagle, Jack. After having him indoors for a white while he became acclimated to life at the Willravel residence and took his medications, he was allowed to go and explore the back yard. At first I left him out a few hours at a time, and never out of my sight, but over time I left him to his own devices. One afternoon I had Jack in the back and a cat jumped down from crossing the fence and came towards Jack. I recognized the cat as Scat immediately and went outside. As soon as Scat noticed me, he went from aggressive and menacing to calm and passive. I took Jack inside and left out some milk.

This is the one and only cat I trust.

Vigilante

Back in the mid 90s we saved a puppy from a litter that was doomed to die of starvation, and named her Feagan. She was the healthiest, which we later learned meant that she was the most aggressive and had the strongest survival skills. She was a bear to train, and I had to train her very intensely because she was willing to bite anyone. If worked, because she later attacked my mom's dog, and mom stuffed her hand in Feagan's mouth, to which Feagan simply let go. I was amazed. We had her for 10 years, and she was the best guard dog we ever had because she adored my wife and protected her from any stray sound or odd visitors. She tolerated me, and I was ok with that, just as long as she knew who was boss

Fast forward to late 2006. My wife's in vet school and really busy, I'm working full time and really busy, and Feagan has to stay in a kennel because she is more than ready to kill and probably eat any of our 4 cats. I come home at lunch at let her out with Rex (both dogs 55lbs) so they can play and goof off. But when she comes back in, she has to go back in the kennel, which she seems happy to do most of the time. December rolled around, and the 10th seemed like any other boring, monotonous day. My wife had to stay at school for the night shift, I was getting home from work, no biggie. I let the dogs out, they ran around, then I let them back in and went to eat and watch some TV. Later on, I let them back out, and then let them back in. This was around 11:00PM. I went back to the study to hit the forums and BS around, and something felt weird. I had the music up and hadn't heard anything, but something felt heavy, strange and unsettled. I walked up front, and saw nothing unusual. Feagan's kennel was covered except for the very front (she preferred that) and there was no noise. I went back and sat down, still uneasy, but able to shake it off. A few minutes later I heard Feagan give out this very unusual howl, like a warning howl, which I had never heard before. The howl started strong and quickly squelched down, and it was at that point I knew something was very wrong. I ran up front and looked in her kennel and she was twisted sideways and dying. I was in shock and trying to rationalize that she was fine and trying to find the vet school number when it hit me that she wasn't going to make it unless I acted faster. I grabbed a towel, dragged her out, wrapped her in it as best I could (limp 55lb chunk of lead that she is, it's more than one might think) and ran out the door with her, got her in my truck, and shot down University Drive at Texas A&M as fast as I dared at 11:15 in the rain. That was about 70-75mph, ignoring lights. By the time I got to the vet school, she was dead. They opened the school for me and tried to save her, but in the end I had to make the call to let her go. That was the hardest choice I had made in my life up to that time. A few minutes later my wife made it to the ER. Even now it is hard to relive.

The doctors got together and determined that she probably died of a tumor on the heart that finally exploded, filling her chest cavity with blood, and basically draining her circulatory system very, very rapidly. In any case, I could have had her at the vet school in 5 seconds and she still wouldn't have made it.

Later on, we went home. We were in bed, obviously very upset and not tired, and then my wife heard a collar jingle like a dog shaking water off. Our other dog was with us in the room, but the collar jingle was up in the living room where Feagan's cage still stood. I heard it the second time and called it, and my wife said she heard it the first time but thought it was her imagination so she didn't say anything. I knew then that something extraordinary was going on. I ran up front and saw nothing, her cage was empty and there was no movement, but the room felt lighter, and I knew we had to have been visited because as I walked around, I discovered her collar in the other bedroom, unmoved since we set it down from the trip home. It was too high for the cats to have bumped it, and like I said it was literally unmoved.

That was the last time we heard her. We saw her in our dreams, in fact we were together with her in our dreams several times. Feagan and I were not that close until she died, but she changed me in ways I could have never imagined.

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Ayashe

You sure know how to make a girl run for the tissue box luciferase75.

I have had many pets through my childhood until now. Some that I chose, some that chose me. Here are a couple that ended up at my doorstep.

When I was in grade school my Dad came home one night with a pet cat, he named it Tigger. He had seen it on occasion outside of a liquor store he frequented. One day he asked the owner if it belonged to him or anyone he knew, the owner didn't believe that he did so my Dad took him home. He was a feisty cat but we had a lot of fun. Tigger had taken over a doll crib that I had, eventually he had outgrown it. My Father tried to remedy the situation by building him a new one. The cat decided he preferred being in the smaller one, oh well. Eventually he grew sick, it was discovered he had feline leukemia.

Once I had a squirrel in the neighborhood that did not seem so easily scared off. I bought a bag of peanuts and coaxed it so far as to take one from my hand. I thought that was all pretty cool until one day I was exiting my house with child in arm and had no nuts on hand. He was pretty insistent that I must had a nut and began to make his way up my leg. That was the end of that, or I thought. I started to have troubles with my car's fan. No matter if I had the fan on high, nothing would blow out. Eventually I got that all dismantled only to find it was packed full of peanut shells. Last time I ever befriend a squirrel..

FuriousAvatar

When I was nearly 9 years old a family friend of ours' had a litter of kittens. Between my mom and the friend they decided I would receive one as a gift for my birthday. Through daily visits after school I chose a funny, independent but often cuddly little furball I named Saber-a name he proved was quite apt for him.

Saber taught me many things about life, such as responsibility, the joys of teaching skills to a newborn creature, and true companionship. He could read my feelings and respond accordingly like no human I know to this day.

After many years of warm friendship, laughter and trust, Saber grew old and developed diabetes, along with arthritis and irritable bowel conditions. It pained me greatly to see him suffering as he was, no longer able to play and frolic as he once had. Even walking became an ordeal, and he was forced to rest frequently to get anywhere.

After much treatment and all the best effort by his vets, I decided to put him down, and I have never in my life gone through such heartache since then. I was with him when it was done; I watched as the first shot immobilized him and deadened his senses, so that he was even more than before unlike the playful, curious cat I had known and befriended. I held his head and told him goodbye as the second shot came a few minutes later, the one that would forever take him away.

I stayed for long moments there in the room with him until I could not feel his presence any longer. A month after I had him put down I planted a tree in his remembrance

archpaladin

Before we were married, my wife had a habit of taking walks around the town she lived. One time she was followed home by a stray cat. She was living with her parents at the time, and they gave the cat some food and let it go. On another walk in the opposite side of town, the cat finds my wife again and follows her home again. This time she got to keep the cat, which she named Zoe.

Now I understand that many women have what is called the "best friend" test for boyfriends. The test is as follows: early on in a new relationship, every boyfriend gets introduced to the woman's best friend, who is supposed to figure out how much of a jerk the boyfriend is and provide honest feedback in private back to the woman. The best friend's seal of approval is important for the continuation of the relationship.

Zoe tends to be shy and disagreeable around guys, so my wife decided that she (Zoe is female) would fill the best friend role for the best friend test. For every boyfriend she had, Zoe was disagreeable and mean, and would claw at them. But the first day I was introduced to Zoe, she climbed right into my lap and started purring.

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