![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
being a good neighbor
This morning on my walk to the train station, as I turned onto the mixed-use path that separates my street from the next neighborhood, I saw an animal lying in the bit of lawn that I think is the county easement rather than the front yard of the house adjacent to the path. Upon doing a double take, I saw that it was a cat, that it was dead, and that it was wearing a collar.
I called Himself to ask what I should do: check if the collar had a tag with contact information on it, or move along nothing-to-see-here? Of course he said I should check for a tag. So I did. It was a hundred degrees out yesterday, so I assume the cat had only been lying there less than a day because although there were flies all around its face, it didn't appear to have begun to decay and there was no smell. Awfully skinny beastie, though. Like maybe it had been out foraging for a while and not finding much. But it had a collar; who abandons a cat with a collar on it? The collar was very old and starting to fray. I just didn't know what to think.
The collar turned quite easily on the cat's neck (so skinny) and I found the tag and called the number on it. Left a voice mail. ("I'm so sorry to have to leave you a message, but. It looks like he died peacefully; I hope that's some comfort. This is where he's lying. After you come find him I hope you're able to have an okay rest of your day." I mean what can you say?)
I texted Himself to ask if he could put something on the neighborhood Facebook group, of which he is a member and I am not. But then I googled the phone number and found that the cat seemed to have lived just a half a block from where I found him, and gave Himself the address and the neighbor's name, which he might even have had in his list of contacts for the block party he's organizing for this weekend. That neighbor might have signed the form saying it's okay with her to close the street for a few hours; she might have volunteered to bring fruit salad. So now I'm also wondering if we should be worried about her. Did she go on vacation and the cat got out and couldn't figure out how to get back in, and now her homecoming is ruined? Or is she in the house by herself suffering and nobody knows? Do I need to call in a welfare check on her? The street view of her house shows me one that I think had some bicycle shoes on the porch when we went canvassing, so someone fit enough to be a relatively serious cyclist lives there. But there were also a lot of clothing donations one time. Did the cat's person pass away and some younger fitter person come to clean out the house and miss that there was a cat?
Anyway Himself just copied me on an e-mail to the cat's person, which he found in his block-party-organizing records. We can easily tell it's the right person because the e-mail address is the cat's name plus the first few letters of the person's last name. /o\
So on the "bright" side I know the cat wasn't abandoned. At least not by his main person. So I still have her to worry about. She's either heartbroken or somehow not okay. Or both. I'm going to have to go by there on the way home with the baby this afternoon and see if I can get someone to answer a knock on the door.
I called Himself to ask what I should do: check if the collar had a tag with contact information on it, or move along nothing-to-see-here? Of course he said I should check for a tag. So I did. It was a hundred degrees out yesterday, so I assume the cat had only been lying there less than a day because although there were flies all around its face, it didn't appear to have begun to decay and there was no smell. Awfully skinny beastie, though. Like maybe it had been out foraging for a while and not finding much. But it had a collar; who abandons a cat with a collar on it? The collar was very old and starting to fray. I just didn't know what to think.
The collar turned quite easily on the cat's neck (so skinny) and I found the tag and called the number on it. Left a voice mail. ("I'm so sorry to have to leave you a message, but. It looks like he died peacefully; I hope that's some comfort. This is where he's lying. After you come find him I hope you're able to have an okay rest of your day." I mean what can you say?)
I texted Himself to ask if he could put something on the neighborhood Facebook group, of which he is a member and I am not. But then I googled the phone number and found that the cat seemed to have lived just a half a block from where I found him, and gave Himself the address and the neighbor's name, which he might even have had in his list of contacts for the block party he's organizing for this weekend. That neighbor might have signed the form saying it's okay with her to close the street for a few hours; she might have volunteered to bring fruit salad. So now I'm also wondering if we should be worried about her. Did she go on vacation and the cat got out and couldn't figure out how to get back in, and now her homecoming is ruined? Or is she in the house by herself suffering and nobody knows? Do I need to call in a welfare check on her? The street view of her house shows me one that I think had some bicycle shoes on the porch when we went canvassing, so someone fit enough to be a relatively serious cyclist lives there. But there were also a lot of clothing donations one time. Did the cat's person pass away and some younger fitter person come to clean out the house and miss that there was a cat?
Anyway Himself just copied me on an e-mail to the cat's person, which he found in his block-party-organizing records. We can easily tell it's the right person because the e-mail address is the cat's name plus the first few letters of the person's last name. /o\
So on the "bright" side I know the cat wasn't abandoned. At least not by his main person. So I still have her to worry about. She's either heartbroken or somehow not okay. Or both. I'm going to have to go by there on the way home with the baby this afternoon and see if I can get someone to answer a knock on the door.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject