Tales of Purrfection — Life with Waldo the Tabby
From the cage above their heads, a 12-week-old grey and white kitten reached out his left front paw as if to offer my daughters a handshake
Adoption & Homecoming
“Please we want a pet…a baby kitten…we’ll help take care of it … even clean his litter box…and it would be so much fun to have a furry creature to cuddle with…”
These pleas from daughters, Julia (13) and Eleni (10), which I had been hearing for a long while, were enough to make a mother’s heart melt. So, on the Friday after Thanksgiving in 2000, we set off to the East Bay SPCA, Oakland office. Confidently, we approached the reception area and announced to the receptionist that we wanted a little kitten to take home. A young volunteer led us to the cat room, filled with more cats than we had ever seen — each within their individual cages. The volunteer turned to me and requested that I supervise my daughters in the cat room.
The girls wandered from cage to cage, noting large cats and small kittens with different demeanors and mannerisms — some frisky, some demure, some playful, others withdrawn. Julia and Eleni approached each cage with curiosity to size up the feline inside. They would ask, “How are you today”? or “Can you show us what you do best?”
From the cage above their heads, a 12-week-old grey and white tabby reached out his left front paw as if to offer Julia and Eleni a handshake. His playful meow enticed them further. His meowing conveyed two clear messages: “Get me out of this cage!” and “Please take me home with you!” It took only a few minutes of play outside his cage for this kitten to cast a spell on all of us. We loved his playful meow, the soft touch of his furry body, and his soft angora-like paws. Learning that he was the last remaining kitten in a litter of five tugged at our heartstrings, and after they told us that he was housebroken and available, we finalized the adoption. Paperwork completed, post adoption instructions given, we were on our way home!
The girls immediately christened him “Waldo” from the Where’s Waldo children’s books. Just as the literary Waldo could be distinguished in a sea of people by his red-and-white hat, so could our Waldo with his torta-patterned coat. Julia exercised her rights as first-born to carry Waldo in his humble cardboard carrier to the car. Both girls sat in the backseat, attempting to comfort him, as he pawed and meowed against the sides of the box. We stopped briefly at the local Petco, to purchase feeding and water bowls, Meow mix, (which he had been raised on), and a few cat toys — balls containing bells or mice, and a fishing pole with elastic line and a large goldfish on its tip.
As we approached our Tudor-style home in Piedmont, I realized nostalgically that I had not made such detailed preparations for a new family member since Eleni arrived home as a newborn ten years previously. Immediately upon unlocking the front door, both girls eagerly opened the cardboard box which had imprisoned Waldo, dropping to the floor on their hands and knees and crawling around like infants as they guided Waldo around his new digs.
Waldo scampered from place to place, his paws patting furniture legs. His inquisitiveness led him to the dark places underneath the beds and dressers. He emerged from exploring their cramped closets as if to say, “I’m glad I don’t have to sleep in there!” We all chuckled as we watched Waldo slip and slide on the bathroom tile floor, as if he was learning to ice skate.
Julia held Waldo protectively in her right hand, using her left hand to contain him lest he take a tumble down the two flights of hardwood stairs. Eleni led the contingent to the basement, which would be designated as Waldo’s sleeping, eating, and litter box quarters. We brought down all the feline paraphernalia purchased from Petco, setting everything out in a way that we hoped would make sense to a kitten.
I scanned the room quickly and spotted a red flag: the monstrous and noisy Sump Pump, which drained underground water away from the house to the city water line. Given the nature of the pump bobbing up and down, as well as its cavernous reservoir, the whole device spelled potential catastrophe to Waldo, so I instructed the girls to always shut the French doors adjacent to the laundry room. This created an effective barrier between Waldo’s living space and the pump.
Now the moment Waldo had been waiting for arrived. He began softly and deliberately munching on his dry pellets of Meow Mix food, his only nutrition since being sheltered at the SPCA. Intermittently, he lapped at his water. Then Eleni placed him in the blue covered litter box. He paused there for a few minutes, and then we heard the sifting noise of the litter — indication that Waldo was covering up his (elimination) tracks.
He peered out the open end of the box, with his adorable hazel eyes, as if waiting for applause, which we enthusiastically gave him. For a few months, we kept a rolled towel at the entry to the box, so Waldo could climb into it without difficulty.
We placed a soft pillow near the sofa bed, which eventually became Waldo’s favorite resting spot. Rhythmically, the girls stroked his angora soft fur. His eyes closed, his breathing slowed, and soon he was in feline Never Never Land. I turned to the girls, and we all thought collectively, “Wait until dad gets home to see our surprise.” I added with a chuckle, “I wish that either of you had fallen asleep as easily as Waldo did, when you were little.”
We ordered a gold-plated heart shaped ID and collar for Waldo, who within days and with Houdini type skill, wiggled out of it. After a two-week period of maintaining Waldo solely inside the house, we gradually gave him some freedom outdoors. He maintained the title of Good Cat at home — he never had poop or pee accidents, fed ad lib, and was friendly to us and other people.
He dutifully deposited his prey (mice, rats, lizards and occasional birds) at the front or side doors. I usually deferred to Ted for their disposal, as I felt squeamish about removing his dead prey. As a nurse, I’d never had the fortitude to work in the ER or take bodies to the morgue, so this was not my cup of tea.
Waldo’s Early Years
As Waldo grew older, his antics and behavior offered new surprises to us. He ‘tolerated’ our two parakeets, Co Co and Limòn, who were residents in our kitchen. One lazy Sunday after church in 2006, my Greek Godmother or Nouna, Kyria Eleni, was over for coffee. Suddenly, we heard the rising crescendo of her voice calling us. “Doros (Ted) and Katerina, the cat is sitting on top of the cage!” she exclaimed in a sharp Greek accent.
We raced downstairs to find Waldo splayed across the top of their cage, as if he were providing them a shield against the afternoon light. Coco and Limòn stood immobilized on their perch by Waldo’s massive presence above them. They were not chirping or making movements toward their food or water. I gently moved Waldo off the cage, told him, “No,” and then let him roam outside for a while. Fortunately, we never found Waldo in this imposing position again.
Another troubling time was during the summer of 2010, when we were in a new hillside home, and Waldo crossed the line on two counts. The first transgression involved bringing his captured prey inside the house. The second involved choosing a prey that I was deathly afraid of — a small black mouse. Waldo marched through the door triumphantly with a wriggling black mouse dangling from his mouth.
Upon seeing it, I jumped immediately onto my bed to avoid any contact with this furry creature. Ted spared me from agonizing exposure to this mouse, eventually retrieving the dazed creature from underneath Eleni’s raised bookcase and placed him back outside on the hilly terrain where he belonged.
After all this chaos, Where’s Waldo? Believing the mouse remained underneath the bookcase, Waldo stayed at this post for hours, occasionally making sweeping motions in attempts to retrieve his prey. Now that the danger had vanished, I could see the humor in it all and I swept my hands many times underneath the shelves, and at long last Waldo dejectedly left the scene.
During Christmas every year, Waldo loved to situate himself underneath the tree, batting around the ornaments on the lowest boughs. We learned quickly to place only the unbreakable, more lackluster varieties of decorations on the bottom tier.
One time, during the summer months, Waldo’s inquisitiveness jolted him in a way the Christmas tree had never done. Scaling a tall and heavy stereo speaker, Waldo stuck his nose into our fishbowl, and it plummeted to the ground. Rocks, gravel, mini palms, and water flooded the floor — this all could be mopped up. The goldfish, however, perished.
The sharp thud of the glass aquarium onto the floor brought angry verbalizations from Ted since we were leaving shortly for our international flight to Cyprus. At least curiosity did not kill the cat, but instead scared one of his lives away!
Waldo’s curiosity led him to many places, including places he did not belong. He was having a normal wandering day when he discovered an open door at the next-door neighbor’s house. As was Waldo’s style, he got on the porch and moseyed his way in. This was about midday, so I did not realize he was missing until I called him in for dinner. No response.
Instead, as I tuned my ears, I heard his loud wailing and desperate meows near the windows of the neighbor’s house. Whether intentionally or accidentally, the front door was locked, imprisoning Waldo inside. I panicked and knew that Ted and I would have to make some difficult phone calls to the property owners, who lived in San Francisco, and were not of an amiable type, to arrange for his release.
It took eighteen hours for the owners to return to the house and release Waldo. Sadly, we noticed Waldo got laryngitis from his constant meowing. He settled comfortably into his basement room where food, water, litter box, and comfy couch welcomed him home.
Later Cat Years
One morning in 2012, I opened the door to let Waldo in after his romp outside. The noxious scent of skunk immediately filled my nostrils as he entered. I isolated Waldo in his laundry room suite, to keep the skunk oils from permanently embedding into the furniture and carpets. Our local vet provided a de-skunking recipe, and I readied the concoction of detergent, peroxide and baking soda in the prescribed ratios. I donned gloves and an apron, and carried Waldo to Eleni’s shower/tub, which had a glass enclosure, perfect for this task.
Although this was the first cat bathing experience for Waldo and me, I proceeded to wet, suds, and rinse him for a total of three consecutive treatments. He was not a happy camper. At the end of each treatment, I always performed the “sniff test” after he was dried. There was still a significant residue of Eau de Skunk, which my nose disagreed with. For the fourth treatment a few days later, I abandoned the previous regimen, and purchased Skunk Off commercial shampoo.
I painstakingly applied the shampoo on small clusters of hair from bottom to top throughout Waldo’s body. It saturated for a few minutes, then was rinsed. Upon completion of this ordeal, Waldo wandered into the laundry room, around the time I was going to blow-dry his fur. I was gathering the hairdryer when I heard a loud banging sound, as if a bat had struck the metal of the washing machine.
I entered the laundry room to note a dent to the front of my washing machine, where Waldo had apparently swatted his water-logged tail against it. He gave me a look that could kill, as if to say, “That’s what I think of this whole de-skunking process…don’t ever do it again.” With that, we kissed and made up, and I used a blow dryer to bring back some sheen and luster to his fur. This fourth attempt was the charm, as no skunk odor remained.
Over the next few days, Waldo sashayed around the house with a new “Punk cat” look, as dubbed by our cousin, Maria. One side of his body was wide stripes of purple and pink from the peroxide effect which gave him even more character.
Waldo’s Legacy
We have countless memories with Waldo. He left his mark on our lives in both good and other less favorable ways — among them the tattered backside of our blue couch and ravaged weather-stripping at the front door, both of which we vowed not to replace while Waldo could still do them harm.
Despite these annoyances, positive memories predominate. Waldo’s one-of-a-kind poses for instance: Yoga (him lying on his backside and stretching his arms in front of his body), Seashell (him curling himself into the likeness of a seashell), Vegging Out (him lounging on the carpet, bed or any soft surface), Cuddly (him folded into the arms or laps of any familiar face that welcomed him), and Lion-like (him crouching when he saw deer from the window). Whenever he heard the familiar hum of our car, Waldo came running, brushing up alongside our legs and welcoming us back to our home.
Our dear Waldo passed away of an apparent heart attack while romping up the hillside on August 26, 2016. Neighbors discovered Waldo and carried his limp body wrapped in a moving carpet to our house. We could not give him a personal grave site because we lived in a homeowner’s association, but we did choose cremation and saved his ashes in a beautiful wooden box that rests atop one of our daughter’s dressers. Sixteen years with Waldo left an indelible mark on our lives and provided us with sentimentality, nostalgia, and myriad stories to tell.
