Officially, this weekend is Mal - that black panfurr, that feline of ferociousness, that tailwagger of terror - being ten years old.
It's been that long ago when I rescued mama cat Ocean from the mean streets of that Bartow apartment complex, with the warning that she might be pregnant, and then finding out YES SHE WAS when she started giving birth at the start of the Fourth Quarter Super Bowl between Denver and Seattle.
Ocean gave birth to six kittehs that night, but I held off on naming most of them until I could determine which ones were which and name them to the characters of the TV show Firefly. Until they opened their eyes, and I took them in to the vet to have them checked out. And then I waited to see which of them was the bravest - or craziest - of the lot to where I would name him Mal (two of the tuxedo kittehs were River and Simon, obviously as River was the daughter to Ocean and so the male tuxedo was Simon, the pretty grey female was Inara (almost Kaylee), the remaining male black kitteh was Jayne and the female black kitteh Zoe).
I wanted to keep one kitteh so I could feel okay about one of Ocean's babies growing up well - the animal rescue I took the remaining kittehs would not allow me to share contact info with their future forever home adoptees - and so I kept Mal thinking he would be the friendliest and fearless of the lot. Instead, Mal turned into a scaredy cat around my parents - essentially the only ones who've visited me over the years as my domicile isn't well-meant for hosting a lot of things (sigh) - and well that's how it turned out.
To ANYONE who adopted Inara, Zoe, Jayne, River and/or Simon, I can only hope they are still with us and that they've enjoyed loving homes.
In the meantime, I got stuck with THIS guy.
Happy birthday, Mal!
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| Ten years old. In hooman years that means he's getting AARP mailings. |
