Chronological List of Acknowledgments

Whatever may happen to thee, it was prepared for thee from all eternity; and the implication of causes was from eternity
spinning the thread of thy being, and of that which is incident to it.
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
(George Long translation, 1850)

Marcus Aurelius, in ancient times, noted that one’s life (or being) is determined by an implication (or regression) of causes. In recent times, research along these lines has been performed and reported by
Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler in their book Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives — How Your Friends’ Friends’ Friends Affect Everything You Feel,
Think, and Do. Many of our ideas are received from friends, and many of their ideas came from their friends,
and so on. Ideas, like diseases, are communicable.

For thirty years I have observed Robert Lev, a friend and business associate, rescuing cats, and affectionately naming them after famous persons according to their proclivities. He named his first cat
Mencken and his third cat Schopenhauer. Visits to his establishment in Ohio over the past twenty years, and locally over the preceding ten years, have had at least a subtle influence on me, predisposing me to the
idea of cats in my house. Today he keeps perhaps ten cats in his house, provides food, water, and heated shelter for outdoor feral cats, religiously observes the TNR protocol (Trap, Neuter, Release), and is on the
Board of Directors of Angels for Animals in Canfield, Ohio.

In 1999, the McGearys, Nelson and Theresa, steered me, more by example than deliberate design, into cat rescue when they rescued Richard and Blackwithe, two elder cats who needed a home. The McGearys were planning a world-tour in late 1999, and were unable to find anyone who could or would take Richard and Blackwithe. Would I be interested in having them at my house? They became my first clowder,
and the rest has followed step-by-step as I became ever more enchanted by cats, leading eventually to the state of being cat-owned.

When Richard and Blackwithe were duly delivered to my residence in the Autumn of 1999 by the McGearys, another good friend, April Nelson, stepped in and assisted me in the basics of cat care and all
things cat.

She herself was rescuing cats and slowly building a large clowder, being always ahead of myself in clowder size and experience with cat-care problems, and always providing helpful guidance throughout the entire journey to the present day. Many were the times in the early days of the clowders that she would take care of my cats whenever I had to travel. In 2003, she had rescued a cat (which she named Binky) with
feline leukemia and, disregarding the suggestion by her vet that the cat should be euthanized, located an animal refuge called Rikki’s Refuge that specialized in caring for elderly, sick, or otherwise unwanted or
homeless animals.

We met the Founder and Managing Director of Rikki’s Refuge, Kerry Hilliard, whose story of the founding of the Refuge is most interesting and forms one of the many sub-threads that have been, using the aphorism of Marcus Aurelius, spun into the thread of being of not only myself, but many others. A detailed history of Rikki’s Refuge is available at http://rikkisrefuge.org/who-is-rikki/.

Kerry Hilliard was also part of the implication of causes that resulted in my acquisition of Percy and Scooter (details in Appendix A). Her long, virtually thankless hours spent in keeping the Refuge going cannot go unrecognized, and her constant message of goodwill and compassion toward all animals has served as an inspiration to not only myself but many others. More than 10,000 animals have been under her
ultimate care over the years since the Refuge was founded in 1998, and she has many stories and anecdotes supporting the contention that most if not all animals have personalities, emotions, and intelligence. Her dedication, tenacity, perseverance, endurance, and adherence to purpose and principle are admirable and rare, and absolutely essential to keep a charitable organization (caring for over 1200 animals at this writing) going year after year. It is probably not an exaggeration to say that without her efforts, many thousands of animals would have perished, unwanted and unloved.

The year 2011 proved to be a pivotal one in which several sources of inspiration toward writing and illustrating a humor book about cats seemed to present themselves to me in the period of several months.
The first of three such instances occurred when cleaning out my mother’s house in the otherwise merry month of May. On that occasion, I discovered almost every school project or paper I had done in elementary
school, which included a few simple illustrations that I had totally forgotten about over the ensuing years, reminding me that I apparently did have some ability in illustration. The second instance occurred when
vacuuming the master bedroom, usually well-awash with cats. It suddenly occurred to me how ridiculous was the effort to keep the house clean while cats roamed freely, leaving a trail of hair-balls and worse strewn
about the environs. It occurred to me that viewed and portrayed properly, such a thing could be humorous. The third instance occurred when perusing books in The Book Loft (www.bookloft.com) in Columbus, Ohio.
On that occasion I found a copy of Suzy Becker’s inspiring (and virtually iconic) cat-humor book, “All I Need to Know I Learned From My Cat,” which has proved to be most inspiring with its gentle humor and perfectly-
suited art work. I have given many copies of this book to friends as gifts.

A number of other people have helped with clowder care over the years. In 1999 and 2000, Brian and Cathy Brown kept Richard and Blackwithe in their home and Brian administered two injections per day
of insulin for Richard, who was diabetic. They also watched Tiger and Scampy in the Autumn of 2002, and Tiger, Scampy, Nudgey, and the very young Percy in the Autumn of 2004.

In the years 2002-2005, a number of people helped take care of the clowder during my travels, including April Nelson, W. A.Luther, H. Kizou, and Katie Farbry.
A new era began when Carrie Bromberg, a former diving coach, started a pet-sitting business. Her knowledge, skills, and abilities far surpassed the ordinary pet-sitter, being able to give injections, administer
subcutaneous fluids, etc. Her boundless energy, especially in the latter years of the second clowder, have been of enormous benefit, especially in regularly administering subcutaneous fluids for Percy and Smokey.
Her love and care for the cats in her charge cannot be gainsaid.

Mr. W. A. Luther also took good care of the clowder a number of times from late 2009 to late 2013, feeding Tiger his 36 5ml syringes of liquidized food every day and administering food and sundry medications to the second clowder.

Dr. Shannon (Etter) Talbott of VCA Alexandria has served with great compassion and ability as the principal veterinarian for the second clowder, and has always made herself available by phone or email on
urgent matters.

Dr. Jennifer Connelly diagnosed Mystique with fatty liver disease in 2007 and kept her alive until I could arrive and begin five days of syringe-administered feeding, which led to Mystique’s full recovery and
everlasting appetite.

Dr. Alysson Berent of the Animal Medical Center of New York performed surgery on Percy on two different occasions to install subcutaneous uretral bypasses (SUBs) shortly after he nearly died from acute
kidney failure caused by a kidney stone that was nearly blocking the ureter from what turned out to be his only functioning kidney. The SUBs extended his life nearly two years until he was suddenly carried away by
a suspected blood clot.

During that nearly-two-year period, Dr. Amber Stiller served as Percy’s local internist at VCA SouthPaws, where a number of veterinary personnel had been trained to deal with the complicated businessof periodic servicing of the SUBs. Percy was well-liked by all; the vet techs who would take him from the waiting area back to the inner sanctum of the hospital for his treatments would often say “Come on, Percy, let’s go see your fan club.” After having striven diligently for nearly two years to control Percy’s kidney disease, Dr. Stiller expressed her sadness to me upon hearing of his sudden passing on September 7, 2015, analyzing the symptoms in view of his most recent physical examination and concluding, in a
reassuring manner, that a blood clot caused by a heart problem had most likely been the culprit.

In July, 2015, Smokey began sneezing blood, and was diagnosed with adenocarcinoma in the right sinus cavity. Drs. Jennifer Hofer, M. Wesley Campbell, and Barbara Biller all ably served as oncologists
with skill and compassion to preserve his life to the extent possible with the current state of science and practice. Dr. Nancy Bromberg, a veterinary ophthalmologist, performed eye-saving surgery on
Smokey when he developed a ruptured left eye after his second radiation treatment. Chemotherapy had not worked at all for his cancer. By the second week of April, feeding him had grown difficult (for he had been
fed by hand using syringes for several weeks by that time, as his appetite had failed), and his weight had started to rapidly drop despite the large number of calories being administered. The trusted opinion of Dr.
Talbott was sought, and the four of us who most loved and were loved by him all laid our hands upon him during his final moments of consciousness as Dr. Talbott performed the euthanization which would ease his
suffering.

Dr. Laura (O’Connor) Tillman graciously found and supplied photos (bless the internet…) of Richard and Blackwithe, earning my eternal thanks; I had been taking few pictures during their stay in my house (an
unfortuantely short one) as my camera had been water-damaged while exploring the riverways of Missouri with the McGearys. One should, of course, in these days of digital cameras, take very many cat photos…

In late April, 2016, a lump was discovered on Mystique’s right side, and Dr. Talbott surgically removed it. Subsequently, the biopsy showed it to be cancer, so Dr. Daniel Brehm of VCA South Paws performed an additional surgery to ensure a clean margin, also removing a second form of cancer found near the original sight. Mystique made a spectacular recovery for a number of weeks, but then started showing stroke-like symptoms. She then was taken for a neurological consultation with Dr. Lauren Talarico at VCA South Paws where an MRI and spinal tap proved the problem to be an autoimmune disease attacking her brain stem. Prednisone was duly prescribed, and again she rallied and recovered, but by late September had stopped eating. An examination at VCA South Paws by Dr. Sarah Sheafor showed numerous tumors in her liver and intestinal tract. Her immume system had apparently given out. A final examination on October 4 by Dr. Talbott showed a blockage in her intestinal track caused by a large growth, for which nothing could be done. The difficult decision to pursue euthanization was made easier by the fact that she could no longer eat or process food and pass it through to excretion. April Nelson was, as always,
there and the two of us laid our hands on Mystique as Dr. Talbott, for the second time in six months, administered the drugs that ended the suffering of yet another clowder member.

Scampy passed away circa October 24, 2019 from a stroke, although at that time he was nearly a year into a diagnosis of bladder cancer, the feline sufferers of which typically survive no longer than a year.
With him ended the second clowder, which had begun with Tiger in 2002. A year prior to Scampy’s passing, a black cat named Buddy, from Liberty Township in Ohio, rescued by Bob Lev, had been brought home and
serves as the senior member of the third clowder, which now includes himself and two cats rescued from Blue Ridge Shores in Louisa, Virginia. They are Midnight, an elder black cat, and Blaze, an orange and white cat of enormous energy and personality. The story of the first and second clowders has been told.

The story the third clowder is now front-and-center in this passing parade of life in which we humans and our animal companions find ourselves.