My First Pet: Butch, the Puppy
My parents were always dog people, and my first pet was a puppy. I was three years old, and we lived in Arkansas on wooded property owned by my grandfather. My grandfather (Pappy) bred and raised Boston Terriers, and one morning he trudged the half-mile of a snow covered path through the forest to our house. He told me to feel inside his inner pocket. According to accounts I heard later, I did so and my face lit up in a big smile, and I gasped, "Ooooohhh. A puppy!" Butch lived with my family for several more years, until he was killed by a car in Des Moines, IA.How Bobby Came Into our Family
Fast-forwarding. The first cat I can remember was a Manx mix gray tabby, predictably named Bobby. I was about 13, and found Bobby as a kitten while walking home from school. We had no pets, and my step-father, Bud, who was from Texas, was vehemently a "dawg" man, and considered cats no-account animals. I don't remember the details, but somehow my mom and I convinced Bud to let Bobby become our pet. We lived in a federal housing project at the time, and Bud likely felt that Bobby could just stay outside, and we'd let him in once in awhile. Heh heh. Perhaps the housing officials had the same mentality, and though dogs were prohibited in the housing units, cats were okay.Bobby was an amazingly agile cat. Our project building was single-story, and the roof was about 10 feet above ground. We watched Bobby leap from a standing start to the roof of that building, then re-create the same leap to the second-story roof of the adjoining building. By then Bud was smitten and would proclaim, "Bobby is more like a dawg than a cat!"
Bobby adored Bud and followed him everywhere. Bud returned the adoration, except for one rainy night when I was awakened around 3 a.m. with the loud sounds of Texan curses and a yowling cat. Bobby had fallen into a tar pit in the refinery near us, and Bud was scrubbing him in the kitchen sink to remove the goop.
Bobby and Bud stuck together like glue, with Bobby accompanying my folks everywhere. He always went with them on fishing trips to Northern California . . .except for one fateful weekend. Bobby followed Bud back and forth from the house to the pickup truck as he packed on Friday night. Then watched out the window as they drove away. I was away at camp, and can only recount the story: They came home to find cat poop on the living room floor, next to a bunch of feathers, a dead rat in the toilet, and a dead bird in the middle of their bed. I've always said that cats don't carry grudges. However, Bobby's "leavings" were an unmistakable message. And they never saw Bobby again.
I no longer have any photos of Bobby. Any that were taken have been lost through the decades since he stole my heart. The photo shown here closely resembles Bobby in his prime. But his spirit will live forever in my heart. Bobby's memory is woven into the tapestry of my life that made me the cat lover I am today.
