NaturallyResilient

About

(The following story was written by my husband, Paul McKinley as it happened to him before I entered the picture.)

Years ago I got two kittens who were almost litter-mates – they were out of 3 litters born within a few days to related queens (momma-cats).  One of them was a darker brown tiger with white patches (or is it white with dark brown tiger-stripe patches?), who had a funny patch on his nose that reminded me of Groucho Marx’s fake moustache.  Did you ever notice that Groucho Marx’s moustache was painted on?  You could tell because it would reflect the set lighting.  So naturally, I named him Groucho.  The other kitten was the runt of the litter, a pitiful little waif with mostly light-gray tiger stripes and a few white patches.  What with the other kitten being named Groucho, this one reminded me of Harpo Marx, so I named him Harpo.

Harpo was a funny little guy.  He seemed to have a bit of cerebral palsy.  You’ve seen cats “lock on target” when they focus on something to pounce.  The more Harpo would focus on something, the more his head would shake from side to side.  I also remember one Thanksgiving when Harpo was maybe 6 or 8 weeks old, we’d put the turkey carcass out for the cats to eat their fill of scraps.  Harpo gorged so much of that turkey that his little body was shaped like a large orange with toothpick legs and little fuzzy string tail sticking out, and you could almost feel from his expressive face the agony over having eaten too much.

The cat scratching post was a homemade one I’d found that someone had thrown out.  It was two 2×4’s nailed together and covered with carpet.  It was just long enough to jam tight between the floor and the ceiling.  Knowing that cats like high perches, I added a “t” shelf to the post about 6 feet off the floor – just big enough for a cat to sit or lie on either side.  Later on I added a string hanging from the end of one of the shelves, with a small piece of wood tied to the bottom so that it would hang a foot or so off the floor.  Harpo and Groucho would bat the wood around and it was hysterical to watch.

One day I was watching TV, sitting where furniture blocked my view of the bottom of the scratching post.  Harpo had been on one of the shelves, but decided to climb down.  Now you know that cats don’t climb down head first just the same as you don’t go down a ladder head first – they “back” down.  And Harpo, being naturally a good-natured cat, always had his tail straight “up” – to him, which meant while he was sidling down the scratching post his tail was sticking out horizontally — and sweeping from side to side as he shifted his weight from one back paw to the other.  Apparently he chose the side of the post to sidle down where the string was hanging, so as he sidled down the post his tail was swiping the string with each sweep.  This wasn’t a problem until he neared the bottom of the post where there were only 4 or 5 inches of string left.  At that point his tail striking the string was enough to make the wooden weight sling around and wrap the string several times around his tail, effectively tying a knot around his tail and holding his hindquarter up where his back feet couldn’t quite touch the ground.  I was focused on the TV and not paying attention to what Harpo was doing, so I didn’t notice this happening, until…

I remember over the course of 15 to 20 seconds hearing Harpo crying, starting with a “hello, what’s this?” to “#*@&&#$!” to a frightened “It’s got me!” to a frantic “AAAAAAGHHHH”!  I looked around to see what was the fuss, and saw Harpo, hanging limp with his forequarters laying on the floor and his hindquarters up in the air hung by his tail, with a terrified but resigned look on his face.

Naturally I jumped up and released him.  I also removed the string from the scratching post — I didn’t want the same thing to happen to his other end.  I still laugh at the range of emotion displayed in his cries when he discovered he’d been caught!  Harpo was such a funny cat!