Sand like debris and wind lashed our faces as we walked down Franklin Road. As Indian
Summer faded the cornfield to the right of us dried up. We were separated from it only by a grass gully still moist from past irrigation. The farmhouse nearby we rented with work hours, and so we took advantage of a daily walk in rural Cayuga County, New York. Cornstalks were frail and ready to die but still made a crinkly symphony when one leaf touched another in the fierce September air.
That was all I could hear as I walked with my husband, I call him Maji, on this day.
He stopped suddenly and put his hand to his ear. "Don't you hear that?!" He asked me.
"No, "I said flatly, "unless you mean the wind through the stalks and trees !"
Then he just took off towards the center of the cornfield , parting the stalks for passage.
He disappeared a few moments but resurfaced with a small, crying, ball of fur in his hands.
Two tiny eyes and limbs reached out to me. "Oh my God!" I said, taking the little grey kitten in to my hands ."How could you hear her from the road?!"
So as much as I knew it was a female, I already knew the answer to the question Maji already shrugged off. My hearing has been compromised from childhood. His hearing is supersonic.
Our walk turned around to bring us back to the farmhouse. Her fur was cold so I wrapped her in a warmed ,clean rag as Maji poured some milk for her in a little tea saucer. On the vintage Formica dining table where I set her down, she stumbled out from the rag and onto on the saucer. The milk was lapped up quickly.
It wasn't hard to imagine that she might have been abandoned by one mother of feral cats that inhabited the old barn next to the cornfield. The story told to us that the old man's who used to feed them was dead so his son came once a week. Feeding them was the only care they received.
We noticed her gate was a little off, and we hoped it was something normal for her newness.
If abandoned, she might have been so soon after birth and without eyesight or hearing, left to wander and die in the cornfield. What defect did her mother find for such a cruel act?
Our slow landline internet revealed that the nearest SPCA rescue center was in Cortland, New York. Packing her up in a clean shoe box and some warm rags, we made our 30 minute trip down the highway. We felt good about our first part of the rescue, and knew she needed a vets attention.
When I entered with my kitten in the small shoe box they asked me where she had come from.
They explained that they handled only the Cortland county animals, that she would need basic care and perhaps specialized care. They wanted to turn us away. I was angry and stood there in reception asking if they wanted me to send her to the cornfield again to die. They had the skills to help her. She was young and could be adopted. They further explained care costs and
zip codes and rules.
We decided instead of leaving, we would sit in the reception area. There was almost no traffic that Tuesday. I said I wouldn't leave until someone could see her and take her. I hadn't come all that way to bring her back . Finally, a supervisor came to bring us in and for $25.00 I could receive one examination for her, and a possible placement.
Our little rescue had a blockage in her stomach, and it could be treated. Someone was gong to come
forward and would be willing to adopt, after care procedure. I said goodbye and when I did so, I sent a little blessing to my rescue that Maji heard above the drone of the withering cornstalks. I've decided that life is full of cries in a cornfield. We need to stop in the maze of our lives and answer them when we can.
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