Book Entry 70: 1966 Mrs. Daniel's Cat

Charlie Daniels was an older gentleman in our church while I was growing up.  I don’t know exactly how old, but even when I was young and he seemed really old.  I remember he married one of the widows in the church.  I don’t remember what her last name was before they married.  My mom and I went to visit the new Mrs. Daniels and took her a casserole one afternoon.  I guess she wasn’t feeling well.  It seemed my mom was always taking somebody food or something.   While we were visiting with Mrs. Daniels her cat came into the room. 

Her cat was a pretty black and white.  His bowl of food was on the opposite side of the room when he entered.  He took a few steps and fell to the right, he got up taking a few more steps and fell to the left.  He’d walk in spurts and fall forward as if his feet weren’t there.  I was horrified. 

I must have gasped.  Mrs. Daniels was startled at my response to the weird gait of the cat.  She explained to me that her daughter worked in a lab somewhere where experiments were done on brains and how they respond to certain medications.  She told me that her cat, along with others, were paving the way to new medicines that would help people.  As she explained the background of the cat it seemed a little less disturbing to me.  Mrs. Daniels assured me her cat was very happy living there with her. 

I got down on the floor and played with the cat for a little while.  It was hard to do.  I tried to get it to chase a ribbon but the poor thing would swat at the ribbon and fall over.  It couldn’t follow my finger with its eyes…they sort of wiggled from side to side.  It couldn’t even make a decent meow sound.  Instead it almost sounded like a human saying, “More, more, more.”  
Just when I was getting back that feeling I’d had of pity for the cat, Mrs. Daniels swept him up into her arms and said, “Watch this Joyce.”  She started singing and petting the cat.  He settled down into her lap.  He looked happy and comfortable.  He started to purr in one of the loudest purr sounds I’d ever heard.  He did seem happy after all.  I felt better when we left, not good, just better!