John Steinbeck once wrote: “The best laid plans of mice and men.” This phrase aptly describes the situation right now. I had decided a few days ago, to just let His Royalness calm down. He was so scared at the sight of any human. He had been poked, prodded, annoyed and I just wanted him to decompress. So I left plenty of food out for him, lots of water dishes and I just let him alone for 48 hours.

Well he showed me- he has vanished! He has found a weakness in the floor and started digging away at it. He tunneled out and I haven’t seen him in three days now. I guess the fact that he was able to use both of his front legs to dig out, means his front leg is no longer a mess. I have been searching high and low for him, but my guess is he is now under the haybarn (which is where the tunnel ends. So I am putting food under there for him as well as water. I am hoping in the next few days, he will reappear laughing at me. He definitely does not want anyone helping him out in any fashion.

I brought him home this morning. He looks so much better than he did before I rushed him to the vet. Not so skinny scrawny (they said he has a healthy appetite. Right now, he is solo inside of the stall enclosure. We are playing an active game of hide-n-seek. He is doing all within his power to not be seen by me at all!

He is still on pain meds and antibiotics, prebiotics and organ meats because he is so anemic. I just warmed up some bone broth for him.

Oh look, here he goes now up to the highest peak away from me.

Yesterday, after returning from town and picking up all my supplies for the coming month, I came home to find a large box on my porch. At first glance as I pulled into the driveway, it looked for all intents and purposes that it was from Chewy.

When I went to pick it up, it was cold although it was a sunny day and it was a bit wet? I carried it inside and to my surprise, there was food inside of it. But food for me! Fresh food, vegetables, packaged meats, spices, dried fruits. No indication of who it was sent by that I could see. The box came from Dinnerly.com  I was told when I called that the boxes will be delivered every Weds indefinitely!  There is enough food in there to easily prepare at least 18 small meals! Fresh corn, eggplant, cucumbers- exotic spices. The recipe cards I was told would be emailed. They would not tell me who sent it.

It took a little bit of research on my part, but I found out this is being sent by a local real estate woman. One, who in the past would call me about finding abandoned kittens and cats in abandoned houses and I would help her out all I could. This is nothing short of amazing at this time. Because I have to divide my donations between hitting the vet bill and buying food my cats will actually eat, this has dipped into my personal money, which I have no problem with. These cats come first always. It just leaves me a bit on the dry side when it comes to my wiggle room (how much money I have left after payday to run the next month). It just left me feeling so blessed.

I have not heard when HRB is coming home. He’s been on total care for a few days. They still haven’t pulled the IV yet, or taken him off the pain meds. He is finally eating on his own- but not bearing weight on that front leg yet. I can’t even go visit him! I did take over yesterday, a thin t-shirt that has my scent on it. I asked them to please put it into his cage, so he can get used to my scent. I had to tell them I didn’t care if I ever saw the shirt again. I just wanted him to have it to start the socialization period. He does indeed put the F in Feral!

Only by the Grace of God, was I able to catch him this morning. He is at the vet’s office as I type this. Before I went into the shop this morning, I set up a cardboard series of tunnels before the entrance/exit hole outside. I weighted those down. Then I put the trap at the final box entrance with the door of the trap inside the box. Bracing the trap was the existing fence.

Taking a deep breath and saying a fervent prayer, I then opened the front of the shop and he was in the back room and out he went! The other cats followed, but since he was first in line, he is the one that got in the trap.  His paw is extremely swollen. I saw quills coming out of them! He’s messed with a porcupine! I guess with all of the humans vanishing out of sight the wildlife in the hills are coming down into our property now. I was told they will call me when he is done being examined and treated so I am waiting for that call.  I’m just so relieved that I caught him finally. First time I have seen him in the daylight.

Three days ago, I decided to get tricky in trapping this elusive boy. He is still not putting any weight on his front leg at all. This is not a good sign. So since I couldn’t easily block the back of the shop- I went inside to see if I could make one main entrance/exit for them. Of course all the cats scattered to the wind when I went inside the shop, so while they were gone, I boarded up all the small exit holes and made only one entrance/exit for them. My idea was to set the trap right on the outside of the entrance, so as HRB tried to escape, I would catch him..Sounds like a good idea right? Well one thing I have learned when it comes to feral cats is they have their own mindset and agenda.

The next morning, I went out, I swung the door open and saw him with the others, so I shut the door quickly. I grabbed the trap and pre-loaded it. I hustled back to the back of the shop and just as I was getting ready to lay it down to cover the entrance- BAM! Here he came underneath the trap, through the gap in the fence and into the blackberry thickets. As he whizzed by my, I caught the stench of decaying flesh. I have not seen him since and am so worried. I almost had him. I almost saved him. Now he is nowhere to be found.

I miss blogging so much. With all that has gone on here, in the past two years, I find I’m at a crossroads at this time. For the first time in ages, I have a manageable amount of rescues here. I am not running all over God’s Country and trapping cats rushing them to the vet to get them help. I find that although I do miss that part of my life, I am relieved right now that I am taking a breather. Currently, we have a dozen cats. When people do contact me about a stray problem, I do everything I can to point them in the right direction to find the help they need. Only under dire circumstances will I step in and rescue.

A lot of my decisions now have a lot to do with losing Mike. Running a rescue without that strong support. Those broad shoulders and arms that would wrap around me and erase the horrors I just witnessed at the last rescue are sorely missed. The stand up guy- who would give up his own time and sleep to pitch in and bottle feed and care for the babies while I went to catch a much-needed nap… Gone…The ears that carried all my woes and heartaches when a kitty would go to the Bridge. The Love that would comfort me along the way all of it is missed.

Compounding all of these changes is that freak accident I suffered two years ago, when Kota slammed into the back of my knees and I flew up in the air, landing with both my legs under my back! The medical consensus at the time was he totally wracked my meniscus, stretching out the tendons and muscles of my knee. This was after seven x-rays were taken of the damage. They wanted to do an MRI but I wasn’t insured, so nothing was done except a round of pain pills and piece of paper that I carried home with exercises to do (that I could not perform).

It took me months to be able to walk again without shaking in pain. I used holistic means, my own version of the exercises that I could do. My right foot had over time developed a mind of its own. It would no longer walk straight. It “drifted” off to one side- so I learned that in order to walk without pain- just to let it drift off to the right. What I didn’t plan on and recently discovered that this unnatural angle has made my bones in my foot shift to this unnatural gait. In order to correct this- they would have to rebreak my foot, shave off the excess bones that have grown. They would then reset the foot with pins and screws. I would be in the hospital a very long time, and in a nursing home for even longer receiving “therapy.” Let’s face it, I am 65 years old. I do not heal as well as I did in the past. Plus once they cut on a foot- bad things can happen. I witnessed this with caring for Mike and seeing all the harm the doctors did on him in an attempt to “make things better.” Ultimately, this “help” ended up costing him his life.

Could something bad happen if I don’t have this surgery? Maybe, but I know something worse will happen if I do. That’s the state of the medicine at least here in this area. So I am going to be retraining my foot to walk the right way. If the bones can shift once, they can shift again.  I am refusing all pain medication offered and instead I am using CBD oil and a wonderful salve I found on Etsy called Joint’s Joy..I was skeptical when I ordered it- but I put in on at night before bed and in the morning, all the painful inflammation that gathers at my right ankle was gone! The redness had vanished and instead of battling chronic pain now. The pain is intermittent. It feels like someone is shooting hot fireworks into my foot- so it is nerve pain. It really flares up if I drive somewhere. Doesn’t matter how far or short the drive is, and the end of it, I am gimping around and in great pain. For awhile the quarantine was a real blessing for me, because I couldn’t go anywhere!

Friday, I went to pick up cat food (that was not there!) This has been happening so much, that I have been buying my own bags of dry food- Fancy Feast for the kitties. They seem to only like that brand these days. I can’t buy the canned, so I don’t. The majority of the money is still going to the vet. We now owe him $732.00 which is quite a chunk still. Anything off the payments I have been making goes to the FF purchases. But just driving to Albany after finally not being in pain for a few days, set me right back to the beginning. One of my local contributors has graciously offered to make the trip for me throughout June. Kathleen, I am so grateful! Thank you again. You keep telling me it is no big deal, but it really is (Kathleen found my blog a bit ago and now we are good friends). She lives closer to Albany than I do.

So I am dealing with all of this and then I get a notice that the law is changing here in Oregon for non-profits. Apparently now, you can only have ten animals period. You have to have full paperwork on all the animals. If they came from out-of-state you have to have  paperwork signed off by both parties relinquishing the ownership. You have to have entry papers and exit papers and the list goes on. Any infraction after the inspection they launch will result in a $600 fine per infraction! I will be honest with you. When I started CATS it was my mission to take only the cats in dire need. No owner surrenders, no cute, fluffy healthy cats or kittens. We were going to help the throw-aways. The ones everybody said couldn’t be helped. That’s why our vet bill is always so sky-high and that is why my vet now repeatedly asks me: “Mary Anne can’t you bring me something easier?” LOL  The answer to that is no. I currently have a new stray that I can’t even get close to yet. Listening to him breathe in the still of the night, he has pneumonia. He will not go under a drop trap, into a trap, into a carrier- nothing. One step toward this royal blackness and he splits. He is pencil thin. He is a Senior. He is neutered. I have tried peppering his food with antibiotics (didn’t work) He’s not eating much and is rail skinny because he can’t smell.

Despite the $700 bill, I am determined to win his trust, get him to the vet and get him help. I am hampered because my days of squatting down next to a scared cat, or sitting on the ground is over. Even sitting on a chair, the height is still too much for him to trust me. If we are bigger than they are, we are perceived as a threat. So I am working several hours a day with just letting him get used to me being among his new friends, my other rescues.

In the hope that he might just go into an enclosure, I recently cleaned one out  and set it up so the cats can come and go at will. If he gets in there, only two escape doors exist. I might be able to close those entrances off and have him confined so I can really concentrate on working with him. That’s my hope, along with whittling down this vet bill so it doesn’t add to the stress I am under currently. Here are some photos of the new revised enclosure:

So that is why I am not blogging much anymore. I do miss it, I do hope all of you still reading my words are safe, away from the madness that seems to be gripping the world right now. Stay healthy, stay safe and pray that I can make great strides, not only in walking in the future, but if catching His Royal Blackness before it is too late.

God Bless You ALL!