Casper the Commuting Cat: The True Story of the Cat Who Rode the Bus and Stole Our Hearts (20 page)
Authors: Susan Finden,Linda Watson-Brown
Tags: #Non-Fiction, #Biography
I did look for signs and messages. On the day that Casper died, there was a story in one of the papers about some poor cats who’d been terribly abused. Casper’s tale was on one side of the paper, and on the other there was a shocking report of one hundred Persian kittens who’d been discovered and rescued by animal welfare officers. They were in such a terrible state from the poor care they’d received that they had to be shaved to remove the urine burns.
I couldn’t get those kittens out of my mind. As the days passed after Cassie’s death, I wondered whether this was a sign. Was I being told by someone – something? – that I needed to open my home to one of these poor damaged little animals? Chris told me that if I wanted to get one, I should, but I was torn. It was too soon; it wasn’t time. Casper had only just gone. And yet, and yet . . .
I felt there was a link. I couldn’t settle. I went to the local cat rescue centre and asked what the procedure was for adopting a cat. The woman said there were forms to complete and I’d need a home visit. She then asked if I’d been a cat owner previously. All my good intentions about keeping quiet about Casper were broken in an instant. It all poured out of me and I was terribly upset. The lady said she couldn’t risk the same thing happening to another cat, and I should consider a house pet. At that point, I informed her that I knew exactly what sort of cat I wanted to give a home to – one of the abused Persian kittens I’d seen in the paper. She said I was too late.
‘That happened months ago, but the papers are only picking up on it now We had sixteen of them – two died because of what had been done to them, but the others have all been re-homed to loving families.’
She asked me whether I’d like to look at the other cats they had, but I couldn’t. I still felt that the link was with the Persians because they had shared headlines with Casper.
I went home and still couldn’t settle. If the local cat rescue centre had known the fate of sixteen of the kittens that meant another eighty-four were out there. I spent the next few days searching the Internet, contacting rescue centres all over the country, chasing up comments on websites – all to no avail. Most of the kittens had been re-homed, and some seemed to have just disappeared. I had to accept that this simply wasn’t meant to be. I’d spent a lot of time and energy on what had amounted to a wild goose (or kitten) chase.
Perhaps it was my way of getting through those difficult early days without Casper, or perhaps I really did think there was a message waiting for me. Who knows? Whatever the reason, whatever the answer, I wasn’t going to be given the privilege of looking after one of those poor kittens, so I would have to channel my love elsewhere.
It didn’t take long for people to start offering me ‘new’ cats. I’m sure that many of them meant well, but there was no way I could bring another cat into my life within days of Casper dying. It wouldn’t have been fair on the new arrival as I was still grieving, and I would have felt I was betraying Casper. He couldn’t be replaced so quickly or easily – no cat could. They’re all individuals with their own characters.
Apart from that, I was also left with a terrible fear of the road. I’d always worried that Casper would be run over as he went about his daily adventures, but now the worst had happened, what was to stop another cat being killed? Although I have loved all my cats dearly and would never have been without the experience each of them has brought me, I can’t deny that every loss takes a little piece of my heart. We all have an enormous capacity to love, but losing so many beautiful animals has made me realize just how high the emotional cost is.
I’m not alone in thinking this, of course. As the letters and messages started to pour in from around the world, I quickly recognized that loss knows no geographical boundaries. Many people told me about their pets, but one young girl really touched me with her story of those she had loved and who had sadly passed on.
Dear Sue –
I hope that you don’t mind me writing to you at a time when you are probably still very upset about Casper When I was six, me and my little brother went to a cat rescue centre and got three kittens. They were all so beautiful – although they were very different from each other, they were from the same family. Molly was tiny and like grey velvet, Freddie was much bigger with grey and white stripes, and Oscar was a tabby. They all had really different personalities too – when we got them all home, they were too small to climb the stairs, but they soon got really naughty and Oscar would take a running leap from one end of the room to the other and claw his way up my mum’s back! Freddie liked to make holes underneath the sofas for them all to hide, but Molly was the one I loved most. She chattered away all the time and we used to pretend she was moaning about things. She was such a dainty little lady, about half the size of her brothers, and she would disappear for ages, only coming back when she felt like it, with lots of complaining to do – and sometimes smelling of perfume! We wondered where she went and whether she had another life somewhere.
As I got older, I told her all my worries – when I was bullied at school when a teacher hit me, when my mum was ill. When she didn’t come back one day, we weren’t too worried as she did like disappearing, but the days started to add up and it was soon a week since she had been home. It didn’t feel right and I tried to make myself strong, thinking I would never see her again. I was right. I came home from school one day and my mum told me that my gran had found Molly’s body close to a main road. It seemed that she had been hit by a lorry. My dad carried her home and I thought my heart would break. I couldn’t believe that I’d never see her again, that I hadn’t say ‘goodbye’, that I hadn’t realized she was going to die. I just wanted to hold her one last time.
I missed her so much, and I vowed to love Oscar and Freddie even more. We moved house a few years later and the boys went to stay with my grandparents until we settled in. Although we were moving to the country with hills out our back door, and the North Sea and beach out the front, there was also a busy road. Freddie and Oscar stayed with my gran and grandad for a while as we built our new house – I wished they had stayed there forever, because within weeks of coming back to us, Freddie was run over I couldn’t believe it had happened again, and all the hurt I had felt with Molly came back.
We then got two kittens to keep Oscar company – Trixie and Lola. Although they were feral, they liked to stay at home, and I was so glad. Oscar did go out, and my heart was in my mouth every morning wondering whether he would make it home, so I was glad that the girls were safe. It turned out that they weren’t as safe as I’d hoped. When she was only eight months old, Trixie started to get very sick. She was crying in pain and unable to eat. We took her to the vet who said that there was a lump in her stomach, which felt as though she had swallowed something, but that she was too weak for an operation. She was put on a drip until she got stronger and when they did open her up, found that she had swallowed an ear plug. She never recovered and there was so much internal damage that she had to be put to sleep. I felt so angry – why did some people manage to keep their pets for so long when ours kept dying? We were good people, we gave them loving homes and were always kind, so why did this keep happening? All of the losses had been too much, so we got a dog in the hope that we could have more control. Jojo was the most beautiful Weimaraner – he wasn’t very clever though, and he fell madly in love with Lola despite the fact that she spent most of her time hitting him! He didn’t seem to mind and would just gaze at her as she would lazily lie there just slapping him over and over! She was very like Molly and I felt very close to her When mum took Jojo for a walk up into the hills, Lola would often trot along behind them the whole way, and when she came back for an exhausted sleep, Jojo would just stare at her lovingly! I finally felt that things were working out with our pets, and as we packed for Christmas in Florida, was happy that the cats were going to a woman we knew, and Jojo was going to stay with his mum and sister. I don’t know what it was, but when there was a knock at our door, my heart sank. It was almost as if I had been too happy – where was Jojo? There was a man there, talking to my dad, and I knew something was wrong. Jojo had got out and been hit by a car All of these cats and now our dog; I didn’t know if I could cope with losing one after the other and I felt that I didn’t want to.
It sounds awful but, after that, I felt as if I was just waiting for something to happen to Lola or Oscar A few months later, when I went out to wait on the bus to high school, I looked across the road and saw a ball of fur, long hair, black and white. I just knew it was her, I just knew it was Lola. She had only started going out at night since Jojo had died, and, as I ran inside crying, I felt as if this was always going to happen. We still have Oscar and I love him so much, but I want him to stay inside all the time, which probably isn’t fair for a cat. I don’t want any more pets ever It hurts too much. You give them all your love, tell them all your secrets, then someone is so thoughtless, so heartless, that they run them over without thinking just how much they are tearing a family apart.
Cats are so independent and I wonder whether we just have to pay a price for having them in our lives. They go away and do things we know nothing about, but, for all we know, they could be facing danger constantly. Although I want to love another cat, I feel as if I can’t risk it – there are only so many times I can have my heart broken. I know that you will always miss Casper and I hope that it doesn’t hurt so much after a while – the pain never goes away, but sometimes you can manage to forget.
Evie, 14, Aberdeenshire
This letter made me cry so much – there was such a lot of pain in it. It was written by a girl who obviously loved her pets enormously but who was having to face up to the hard facts of losing them, one after another.
I knew exactly what she meant when she said that it seemed so unfair that some people managed to keep their pets for years despite not really loving or looking after them I’ve seen animals treated with such cruelty but they still love their owners, still hope for a bit of kindness, and those owners don’t seem to realize how blessed they are to have those creatures in their lives. Yet here was this poor young girl facing up to the loss of so many in such a short time. If people could only see that they are privileged to have animals in their lives and make the most of them when they are there. Many of us would do anything to have a few more moments with the ones who continue to hold our hearts even though they have passed on.
I try to reply to everyone who gets in touch about Casper, but this was a tricky one. I told this young girl that I really appreciated her taking the time to write and share her thoughts, but that I was sad reading about her pain. I wished that I could give her a simple reason why God takes our cherished pets away so suddenly, but I couldn’t. I suppose He has the answer, but whatever that reason may be, it still seems terribly unfair.
What Evie’s letter brought home to me was that, although my heart was breaking over the loss of Casper, the thought of her losing so many pets at such a young age, one after the other in such horrible circumstances, was horrible. I pleaded with her:
Please don’t say you will never have another pet. Maybe one day, somewhere, somehow, an animal will cross your path and you will feel that you can give it a loving home. You may have to wait until you are older, but you will know when the time is right. You love animals too much to say ‘never again’.
Her hurt sounded so deep. I recognized that she was afraid of loving a new pet if it was going to be ripped away too soon. But this young girl had hit the nail on the head: we do indeed pay a high price for having animals in our lives. Of the eight cats Chris and I had in our lives not so long ago, we now had two and each loss had taken something from my heart. Each time I vowed that I would never be able to go through it again, but I couldn’t be without cats in my life. I feel it is my purpose to give happy, loving homes to poor old things with little hope left and, if in the process I have to go through some hurt myself, that’s just the way it has to be. I couldn’t have a home without my babies. We were all put here for a reason and perhaps this is mine. I finished by telling her:
Your letter will always be treasured, Evie, and I will keep it forever as it was from your heart. As I said before, the hurt never ever goes and we don’t forget the pets we love, but somehow we do learn to adapt and loving is what many of us do best.
I hope my words comforted her in some small way, as hers had touched me. These people who were taking their time to contact me were managing to fill the gap left by Casper in a truly amazing way – the human kindness that was being sent to me in floods was changing the way I thought of the world, and I could take enormous comfort in that.
I had some decisions to make. The first was whether I wanted to see the photograph of Casper and me on the buses every day. Karen from First Devon and Cornwall had been very solicitous and worried that it might be too much emotionally. Despite the cost and the inconvenience, she reassured me that the company would comply totally with whatever I wanted. If I couldn’t bear to see Casper in happier times, then they would remove the posters immediately. I thought it over and did have worries that I might have to face some horrid comments if the images remained. However, the longer I considered it, the more I felt that it was perhaps a fitting tribute to Casper. He had loved those buses so much and the photos were delightful ones, so I decided to allow them to remain. I have had only lovely comments from fellow passengers. I still get a shock at times when I see them, but there are such happy memories associated with those days too.