In a few minutes, they came through the exam room from the waiting area to go through another door into the medical area, behind the office. The two guys were carrying a large metal washtub with a board under it.

Several minutes later the two guys and the vet emerged, and the guys left. The story was that one of the guys owned a nearby business and he had seen a cat wandering around for a few days. He thought she had rabies, so had called animal control, who wouldn't come for a rabid cat. He called the police, who called animal control, and still no luck. So, he had called this vet office, as it was nearby. The doctor told them how to catch the cat without coming into contact with it (put a tub over it and slide a board underneath), and she said they could bring the cat in.

So, I asked her how the cat was. She said she didn't know if it had rabies or not, but if it did, it would probably be dead in a few days. She said it had a large hole in its neck and definitely had some neurological problems. Since I do a lot of volunteer work for a cat shelter I see a lot of things like this. I just took it in and let it sit in my mind.

The next day, it suddenly struck me. Wow, this cat is going to need a home if it lives. I already have two cats with neurological problems (Weeble and Wobble, see below)... I wonder if this cat is going to be ok? I thought about calling, but decided to wait. I had an appointment in a week, and thought I'd just go in then and see if the cat was still alive.

A week later, I'm taking Weeble in. As I'm driving to Normanside I'm thinking "if it's a gray tiger cat, I have to take it home." Mind you, I had not even seen the cat yet!

I come in with Weeble and the receptionist says "And who do we have today?" I said "I have Weeble." and someone else from behind the desk shouts "Really?! We have a Weeble too!!"

The vet brings out their Weeble. Ah yes, it's a small gray tiger cat! Tipsy with neurological problems .. the hole in the neck is from a grub ... but she's eating and getting better and does not appear to have rabies. I ask to adopt her, and the vet (who actually was one of the vets who treated Jordan for kidney failure eons ago) agrees but says she has to keep her a while longer.

When my husband and I do bring Weeble2 home we realize pretty quickly that there's something else wrong with her that we can't put our finger on. It took us about a month, but we finally determined that she's 100% deaf!

Great, I've never had a deaf cat before. Now what? Well, one benefit is Leda can't hear Callisto growling at her, I suppose. Leda has learned some hand signs! She understands "come here," "go that way," comes running to the kitchen when we show her her food bowl (we have to wake her up to eat, else Wobble will eat all her food), and she ignores "no," just as any normal cat would. Oh, and her name is just an L shape, made with one hand. Flash her an L and she comes running and meowing. It's the cutest thing. And if you wave "bye-bye" she will go see you out (the other cats do too, just because they can hear you getting ready to leave). Oh, and she meows at us, very loudly! She knows we respond to this noise she can't hear .... it's all very strange.

And just for fun, we call her Leda-Weeble. Where does the name Leda come from? It's a moon of Jupiter. (We started with Io -- whose mother was named Jupiter, then obtained Callisto, and now have Leda).

Callisto Callisto is a purebred Maine Coon. I know, how did we end up with a purebred? She came from a good friend, right after my father died unexpectedly. Callisto was born right around my father's birthday. (He died three days before his 60th birthday.) And our cat Jordan was at death's door as well. Callisto has a large local family. We know and visit her father and her mother and many of her siblings. Callisto, of course, would just prefer to not know them. Cats are like that. At any rate, Callisto came to us at a very sad time in our lives. I felt bad that I was so sad then and really couldn't give her all the attention I would have normally given to her. But, we've been together several years now and of course we're all fully bonded to each other. Callisto knows she is perfect, especially compared to Weeble, Wobble, and Leda-Weeble, but what she won't admit is that she has a twisted tail. One vet said she was most likely crushed at the bottom of the uterus under all the other kittens. Her tail had been broken in two spots, near the base. She was born that way, and her tail remains that way. At rest, her tail lays on top of her back, and pokes over her shoulder, next to her face, like a feather boa. You're always looking at the underside of her tail... that's the side that faces up. But, Callisto knows she is perfect. :)

Weeble and Wobble

Weeble and Wobble are a bit of a special case. They most likely have what's called cerebellar hypoplasia. This means they have trouble walking ... often the hind end gets ahead of the front end and they do a lot of circling! I view it now as a special ballet they have ( ... it takes three circles before you can go out the door to the enclosed porch, which you just begged to have open... it takes three circles in the hallway before you can turn left to go into the room you wanted to play in.... you might push a door open to enter a room and your tail enters first!). They also have some twitchy problems ... the more they want to do something, like eat from a particular plate, the harder it is ... the head kind of twitches and turns away from the plate and the body won't locomote in the right direction. One guy leans on the wall as he walks, introducing a new cleaning challenge (... how DO I get that gray stripe off the wall?).

These cats have poor eyesight. Wobble has two eyes with a little peripheral vision. Weeble has one eye, the other no longer exists (he just has an empty eye socket, we have dubbed it his N'ye -- a contraction for Not Eye, since it is sometimes the subject of discussion or cleaning) -- and also has a little peripheral vision. A couple of vets have said his eye probably ruptured, I would guess from an infection. However, they chase bugs, although they lose them easily, play endlessly with pipe cleaners, and can track moving toys and chase them at high speed all over the house somehow!

These cats were removed from a colony of feral cats living outdoors, during a neuter-and-release program. They were taken into a foster home and socialized with humans. Whiskers did take them to adoption clinics at PetSmart, but the brothers got too stressed out. I was told Weeble wasn't too bad, but Wobble was hissing and growling, which kind of made people not want to take him home. Oh, and they had to be adopted together since when they were young Wobble depended greatly on Weeble to guide him around. The short of it is, they didn't get adopted.

Time passed, they grew up into beautiful cats. But their foster parents separated, and they were at the home of the person who wasn't responsible for taking them in. Their person was moving out of state. It was important for them to find a permanent home, soon. Whiskers was trying to figure out a way to make a special space for them at the already full shelter.

During all of this, I had looked at the Pet Finder web site, and I had seen Weeble and Wobble. They really caught my attention, but I think at that time one of our cats, Jordan, had just died and we had just gotten a kitten from a friend. However, a year later, I happened to look at that web site again and W&W were still there. I was specifically looking for special needs cats since we have no children and could provide a quiet home for such animals.

I sent some e-mail to see if they were really still available. We did go visit them at their foster home, where they hid under the couch and hissed. But I thought "They're cats, they'll be fine, even if they live under my bed for three months at first." A week or so later, we picked them up at the vet's office and brought them home. They were about two years old.

Both came out of their crate the first night ... Wobble first, then Weeble. By morning they were crawling all over us when we sat on the floor, and gave us the most incredible amount of unconditional love (well, ok, we did feed them ;) They're now integrated into the household and over time have actually improved their walking skills and they now can jump onto things! They have even caught two mice. (My friends joked "those must have been some blind mice!")