Moggy vs. Mom

... and if any animal happens to follow you kids home, it’s going straight to the pound.

This was a statement my mother would regularly scream at both my sister and I whenever we would bring up the topic of getting a cat. Another staple of Catholic guilt from my Mom was “You remember what happened to Bingo!” I would have been four and my sister five when a family friend gave us a puppy and, you guessed it: Bingo was his name-o.

We didn’t have a front fence at the time and one night he was run over by a car, a devastating experience for any child. Naturally my Mamma decided this was a great thing to weaponize against children. This led to my formative years being consumed with me believing that if we got another pet it would end up getting squished and of course it would be our fault.

There were plenty of other rational arguments used, like “if we go away, we will need someone to look after it” and “you won’t walk it”. It didn’t stop us kids pestering every now and then, we both really liked animals, my sister went on to become a veterinarian so obviously she really loved animals. But growing up, if we wanted to get cuddles from pooches or kitties, we needed to find a friend or family member that had one.

The only exception to the no animals’ rule was the chickens we owned that were only allowed because they provided eggs for the family. Mom had grown up on a farm with cows and horses, so I guess I just figured she only valued animals that provided food.

Fast forward a few years later. I was in my last year of school and my sister was away in her first year at university. It was probably about 8 o’clock at night and there was a mournful cry from the front door. It was constant and unrelenting, it was so noticeable and concerning that it made Dad turn down the TV, which is no mean feat. We opened the door and there was the saddest looking pure white mix of fur and bones you ever saw. This cat was hungry, it was hangry, it looked as though it hadn’t eaten in a month.

I heard a nurturing voice come out of my Mom, that was so foreign to me I looked at her with amazement.

“Oh, poor little moggy, it’s starving, I’ll get it some food.”

Who is this woman? Did I miss something? Have I been struck on the head?

“Mom, if you feed it, it will stick around” was my response to whatever being had taken over my Mother’s body. “Quiet you, I didn’t ask your opinion” she barked back. Nope, ok, that sounds like the woman I’ve known for the last 17 years.

She got some food and some milk, and both were devoured in seconds. The scrawny white cat wandered off into the night, we closed the door and thought that would be the end of my Mother developing a bond with another living thing.

Next morning, scrawny white cat was back at the front door. Again, food was provided, and again, it ate it up in a few seconds. It didn’t leave in a hurry this time and I even saw Mom give it a pat. Ok, physical contact and affection? Something smells fishy here, and it’s not the tin of tuna you just gave this feline!

“Someone must have lost it, the poor thing, I’ll put some fliers up and see if someone calls”

Were these words really coming from the same woman who told her six year old son to “swallow your own spit” when he told her he was thirsty during a long car ride.

She made up multiple posters, but nobody claimed this cat. She bought the best cat food and made up a bed in the garage. Within a week, it was starting to put on weight, and more importantly Mom had willingly breached her own rule of no animals in the house. It sat on her lap as she watched TV, or while she talked on the phone, there was no repulsion displayed by her. It became evident that this cat was going nowhere in a hurry. The only thing was it hadn’t been given a name, it wasn’t Snowy or Blizzard or Vanilla Ice, it was merely referred to as Moggy. I can only assume that once something has a name, then my Mother is no longer interested in it.

So, Moggy stayed. About two months after moving in she was pregnant. Again, for a staunchly Catholic woman, Mom seemed to forgive this pregnancy out of wedlock pretty damn easily. The litter was born and distributed to various people around the neighbourhood. Moggy, however, got a trip to the vet and that would be the only time she would have kittens.

The family hierarchy was soon adjusted so that it was Mom, Moggy, Dad, my sister and then me. After I finished school Mom and Dad would arrange trips away, they left me detailed instructions on what to feed Moggy and when to feed her. Leaving meals for their only son was not as much of a priority.

Twelve years passed, and I had long moved out of home. I got a call one day from my Dad. Now my Dad calls me for two reasons, my birthday or for deaths in the family. I am being generous, quite often Dad will shout from the other end of the house if Mom is on the phone “Happy birthday from me too!” It wasn’t my birthday this day so I braced myself.

We went through our traditional greeting

Dad: Hey

Me: Hey

Dad: How are you?

Me: Good, how are you?

Dad: Good.

Dad broke the news to me as sensitively as he could “Moggy died. Your Mom’s pretty upset. You might want to call her.”

Now we suspect that my Dad was born with a word count that he was limited to for his life. We don’t know what that word count is, but he uses words fairly cautiously, so that was probably a much longer conversation than we would normally have. I am not the person you get to call Mom to comfort her. I am, however, the person you get to call Mom to send her into a white hot rage because I didn’t take the career path she wanted, or because I haven’t removed all my childhood things from her home so she can turn my bedroom into a sewing room, or because I have washed a shirt with the wrong type of detergent.

But I’m a good son (unless you ask my Mom), so I rang. She was bawling, she couldn’t form complete sentences, she was inconsolable. I felt genuinely bad, Mom was hurting, and almost sounded like she needed a hug. She went on to tell me how good a cat Moggy was, and how she didn’t know what she would do without her. I didn’t know what to say because I hadn’t seen this side of her. We just talked about Moggy, and some memories I’d had of her, Mom laughed at some and cried at others.

When we ended the conversation, Mom said something I hadn’t heard her say to me before, she said “I love you”. Now I know what you’re thinking, at this stage in your life I am sure your mother has said that to you, but she hadn’t. We weren’t a family that said that regularly, or at all. To hear Mom say it know was equal parts beautiful and scary.

Time healed her wounds, but Mom never got another cat. She looked after my dog for a while and again this animal was spoilt beyond all comprehension. It was a fight getting him off her when I was able to get him again.

My daughter got a stuffed cat for her first birthday, Mom suggested she name it Moggy, but my daughter named it Max. My daughter is certainly not the favorite grandchild now.

More than twenty years since Moggy left us, Moms email address is Moggysmom.

In the end I guess there are just those people that get on with animals a lot more than they do with other humans.