September 19, 2017
In Memory of
Our Beloved Moookie
In the summer of 2002, a young, grey, scruffy DLH cat was introduced to Teresa, as the result of severe cruelty by a “human-being”. Estimated to be about 3-4 years old, Moookie, as he would become known as, survived emergency surgery, but they were unable to save his eyes.
Upon recovery, it became quickly apparent this was a “character kitty”!
Teresa happily took him on as her own clinic cat – and the creation of a great friend had only just begun.
Moook lived for a short period of time in the back office of Teresa’s clinic at the time, which connected to Fairfield Animal Hospital, and his best cat friend, Dill Pickle. Many a day the two fools would stalk each other. And yes, blind Moookie would stalk Dill.
Adaptive, is one adjective that best summarizes “Mr. Mobear”. It took him only a matter of days to relearn his world with the move into Teresa’s first solo location on Kirschner Road. Again, after our expansion of the Kirschner location; coping with an expansion renovation, and again moving home for the summer of 2016 living in our garage, then finally to our new location at Sitara Animal Hospital. In all of those absolute disruptions of his sightless world, he never complained — only adapted. Yes, after learning the spaces, he’d mark his spot for litter boxes (3 was his usual requirement), and we’d be good.
Well, we’d be good until the next bowel movement that routinely peeled the paint. Usually he’d time it so that Teresa would be “trapped” talking on the phone to clients.
Client files were always a great toy for Moook, as they crinkle when you jump on them, especially when someone was working on them. No surface was ever unattainable for him. He could get up on any chair, desk and sample food left behind by his “staff”. After all, he was our clinic C.F.O. (Chief Feline Officer), and we were the staff. Even one case when Teresa had brought the body of little bird into the clinic that had been hit by a car, left him on her desk to show others, only to come back into the office full of feathers everywhere, but no little bird. Only a happy cat!
Moook always knew his boundaries of where he was. On long weekends, or holidays, he came home with us and LOVED to roll in the dust in our yard. He loved being outside with us, gardening, weeding and on occasion, quail hunting. To the point of taking a “leap-of-faith” over a small bank where his targets were mingling below. Needless to say, amusing was his middle name.
He always knew, and never once tried to leave through any clinic door, in any of the locations.
This was a kitty that never did without toys. Christmas came as usual, but also throughout the year. Anything that made noise, or smelt like cat nip, he was on it. Loved to play, and play he did. Many a day, you’d never know he didn’t have eyes by the way he’d race around chasing ghosts. His sight was never actually lost you might think. This was never more apparent by his sleepy habits; one paw draped across his “eyes” to darken the room.
This was a soothing soul. He always knew when a client needed a cat cuddle, or when to warm their lap. Or when he knew a patient was recovering on the floor, Moook was always there for a warm blanket, or maybe a morsel of food.
Moookie had “seen” his share of smoke and fires. The 2003 wildfires were a smoky, quiet time for him. The big building fire, just down the road on Kirschner, had us scrambling to get him out of harm’s way, as was suggested by a firefighting friend.
Right up until the end, Moook always let us know if he needed help. Always (well almost always) an easy guy to treat.
Always happy, and always made us laugh, and feel loved by him. He has a southern drawl and could howl with the best of them. Grooming was never his thing – again, he had staff! He would happily be clipped and bathed and groomed for hours, leaving a large pile of drool on his path.
His life touched us all, and he is SO missed!
Until we meet again…
May memories guide us through this terrible heartache that we feel. I looked for you today Mookie and then remembered you are off on your own journey. ….. Miss you so much.
