Roux: We love our pets, through happy and sad

My sister gave me a subscription to “Garden and Gun” magazine as one of my Christmas presents. I was thinking about how to describe it, so I went to their site for a bit of research. The woman who launched it had careers at “GQ,” “The New Yorker” and “Fortune.” The editor-in-chief had previous stints at “Field and Stream” and “Saltwater Sportsman.”  That combination of publications nails the range of advertising and articles better than I ever could.

“Garden and Gun” is big on dogs, and the website features fabulous photographs. A column in the last issue entitled “The Trophy Huntress” by Jonathan Miles had me laughing aloud. How often does that happen with print? His description of the dog with smoker’s cough from eating bonfire sparks and the half-eaten, buck-toothed squirrel left as a special gift on the bed pillows just got me going.

We do love our pets.

The first one I remember was Brucie Roux. Natives my age will remember him. He had a distinctive Pekingese face with lower teeth that jutted out, giving his visage quite a fierce countenance. There was probably some Spitz mixed in because he had fairly long hair and a glorious tail that plumed over his back. Brucie was quite the man about town. He would saunter down to the bay for a morning dip and then make his rounds to say hello to the ladies. He killed chickens and chased cars. He was hit three times. Once we almost lost him.

There were no veterinarians in the county in those days. Mama made him a pallet of blankets next to the big box heater. She went down to Mr. Joe Taranto’s seafood house and got a bucket of trash fish which she boiled until they became a liquid mush. Tears dripped down her face as she spoon-fed the little cuss. He recovered, although he was always a tad down in the back during cold weather.

Brucie lost his spark after Daddy drowned in 1963 and succumbed to old age not too long after.

We always had cats as well. The first one I remember started out as a particularly pitiful specimen. I had ridden my bike to town on Saturday morning and saw the little grey tabby cowering in front of Buzzett’s drug store. Foregoing my ice cream cone, I loaded him into my front basket, held him down with one hand and steered with the other as I navigated back home.

Mama took one look at his swollen eyes and flea-ridden coat. She said, “Oh, Necie.”

The quick remonstrance complete, she set about filling the kitchen sink with warm, soapy water for a thorough bath and filling his tummy with warm milk. Disbelieving the largesse always available, he never stopped eating. We started calling him Obese Kitty, which morphed into Obadiah, in the way that cat’s names often do. He grew to enormous size and enjoyed a long, leisurely life in the sunbeams.

Through the years, there were many cats. We lived at a fairly busy intersection that provided a convenient drop-off point for those cretins who blithely discard animals. Sometimes, the critters just wandered up seeking a soft touch who would provide daily victuals.

A huge, yellow male adopted Mama. He was allowed indoors on occasion, elevating him to a preferred status. She called him Punkin.

She looked out the kitchen window one morning and saw a lifeless, bloodied heap in the road. She did the honorable thing, scooping him up and placing the old cat gently in a towel-lined cardboard box. She dug his grave in the back yard, lowered him into it, and said a little prayer. As she patted down the earth and then leaned on the shovel contemplating another little life lost, she glanced up to see Punkin meandering across the yard, loudly demanding his breakfast.

She said, “Necie, I don’t know who I buried, but he had a nice funeral.”

We truly are fools for our animals, but we are the better for it.

Denise Roux is a regular columnist for the Apalachicola and Carrabelle Times. To reach her, email her at rouxwhit@mchsi.com