Precious

As many of you know I use to work at a veterinary clinic. I have buckets of stories from my year and a half there that I plan to compile in a book that will no doubt bring me unimaginable wealth, because, let's face it, people are suckers for books about animals. But the funny thing is that it won't be about the animals. See how tricky I am? The best stories are all about animal owners.

Along with vaccines and routine surgery we also offered boarding. It wasn't anything fancy. We had runs for the dogs and pens for the cats and every animal got taken out a few times a day to play and run around. The only animals that got to roam freely were Brutus, the office dog, Mooshie, a 7 pound Maltese, Tina, 125 pound rottweiler (both boarded with us 3 or 4 times a week and new the rules, i.e. no peeing indoors or attacking the clients), and Will the office cat, who was paralyzed from the waist down so he did more scooting and swishing than roaming.

Before I continue I need to make the distinction between Pet People and People Who Have Pets. PWHP are those who like animals and like having them around but can tell the difference between an animal and a human. Pet People are those who dress their dogs up for tea parties, who schedule photo shoots for them, who refer to them as "my children". Crazy people.

We had a few Pet People as clients but the best one was J. Walch, owner of a cat named Precious. Or, more accurately, Precious Baby Pudda-Wudda Kitty Cat Walch. J. Walch called me one day in a panic. I was use to this. She never called in anything but a panic. Everything was dramatic and an emergency. She was going on a church choir retreat and her son was suppose to watch Precious for her but he flaked out at the last minute and now she is thinking about canceling the trip because she "couldn't leave Precious alone for two whole days! He'll just DIE!" Could I be a doll and see if there was any room in our kitty facilities? There was, thus saving Precious' life. Celebrate!

J. Walch showed up the next morning in tears. And this is practically verbatim so I'm going to put it in quotes (It's my blog, I can make up grammar rules if I want to.):

"Precious is livid! We had a fight this morning. He did not want to come. He absolutely refused to get into his carrier. REFUSED! What was I to do? I can't force him to come if he doesn't want to. But I couldn't leave him along so I forced him into his carrier. And guess what he did. He soiled himself. To calm him down I promised that he would have a lovely time with his friends and that you would be so loving and gentle with him. Well, he told me that if he could write a letter to you about how he likes to be treated then he would feel much better about the whole thing."

And then she handed me a letter, sealed in an envelope and addressed to "Dr. Mintzer and Nice Ladies." She asked me to read it.

It went something like this (and I'm not making any of this up and J.Walch was entirely serious about it):

Dear Dr. Mintzer and Nice Ladies,

I've very nervous about staying with you so to ease my fears I'd like you to know a few requirements I have while on vacation.

1.) I like to have soft music playing. Preferably Mozart.
2.) I think it would be lovely if you would light a few candles in my room.
3.) It goes without saying that I would like my own room. And I would like to spent time with you in the lobby so I can see the other animals coming in and out.
4.) I like to have fresh air so please open the windows and doors. Please make sure that there is plenty of sunshine for me to lounge in as well.

I'm sure that if you follow all of my wishes everything will
go smoothly.

Sincerely,
Precious B.P.W.K.C Walch

I smiled, took Precious, waved bye-bye to J. Walch, put the letter in Precious' folder and took him back to the cat room where I put him in a cage told him that if he had mastered typing a letter than he would certainly be able to imagine candles and Mozart. And then I shut the door.

I would like to say that she was as crazy as it got but I haven't even told you about the lady with 13 cats.