Thursday, January 5, 2017

Looking into My Son's Future

I wanted to keep telling you about Blitz. When we left off, we still hadn't picked him up. We hadn't even named him properly. They were calling him Yeager. Everything about our furry family was about to be thrown into the air. Everything was uncertain and exciting. That seems like a long time ago. A long, long time ago.

I was afraid our wild kitten would spend his first week cowering in that narrow space between the tub and the cabinet. But all worries aside, we were on our way to pick up our little munchkin. The poor baby was going to get shots before he came home, and an exam with a thermometer. How nasty was that? So I promised myself we'd sit quietly with him for a little while, just hold him for a bit first.

I'd planned to visit him that morning, but they called to have us pick him up instead. So, he had to wait until after I volunteered at school, after an appointment, after we got kitten food at the store, and after an exam with the vet. Well, crap.

Was he going to cry all night after we brought him home? I knew he would cry even if he didn't make a sound. He wouldn't see anything we did as care that first night, torn from his brothers and sister. There was no getting around it. He was going to be stuck with one hot mess until he realized we were okay, that the bathroom was safe, that the house was safe, that the strange cat and dog were safe. I wished we could have introduced Teddy at the clinic. I wished so many things. I wished we could take it calmly and slowly.

When we arrived, everyone was excited, taking pictures and thanking us. It was anything but calm and slow. But they kept thanking us for taking one of the little orphan kittens. It felt odd, really. I saw it as us finally bringing our baby home after waiting so long.

Nick was so excited. Any time you get a sixteen-year-old boy to grin like an idiot, you know you're doing it right. No amount of cool could wipe that look off his face. All through the exam, he held the baby. Nick's face was lit from within

Sometimes a mom looks at her son's future within the present. We can't help it. I imagined him with his own baby.

And it was a beautiful thing.

Thank you for listening, jb

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