Today I Buried A Kitten

It was barely two months ago that this kitten came into the world. It seems like so much longer. It was a little boy that was born to a female gray-striped cat that I named Sheba. She was abandoned by her owner and left starving in the woods, so I fed her and developed her trust.

Her kitten was severely injured somehow. I have not found the source nor figured out how. It was filled out and looked healthy, and then it showed up limping along like a drunken pirate leaning to one side, barely able to move forward. It could have been a dog or a snake that harmed it. I'll never know. The poor thing looked like it's belly went to his chest and there was no longer any stomach where it should be. It was breathing too hard and fast. There was no blood anywhere, and I could not find any puncture wounds nor bite marks.

For awhile, it seemed as if it would recover. I gave it antibiotics and monitored it closely. Last week, it wasn't breathing as well and was losing the remainder of it's weight. There are no vets nearby and no one to carry me.

The baby stopped eating two days ago and died this morning. I asked the people who owned this place if they would tell me where to bury it, help me to dig a hole, or how they wanted to take care of it. Where I come from, you don't leave dead animals around to rot. Even in the country and on the roads, at least animal control would come by and pick up the dead animals and dispose of them.

No one seemed to care. I spoke to my landlords, my neighbors, and never received a reply. This afternoon while they were doing whatever they had on their agenda, I went and buried this poor kitten.

No one helped. There were two men nearby that I had asked, and not once was I told that they would take care of it. I went back out into the heat of the day, grabbed the shovel, went behind a building and near a tree and struck the ground to see if I could get the shovel into it. Slowly, inch by inch, layer by layer, I made a circle and broke some roots as I did my best to pull up some dirt. I kept at it until the hole looked big enough. Then I picked up the plastic bag that I had the animal inside of and placed it in the ground. I carefully covered it up and placed a large concrete block on top of the mound hoping that the dogs could not dig it up.

I'm not used to being ignored when I ask someone to do something for me. Especially when it is something that I feel a man could help with. It made me even sadder to think about the animals in this world where people have no compassion nor empathy.

I hope others will become more sensitive and aware of the animal's plight as well as the emotions of others who care for them.