What we can do we will do

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It's exactly four weeks ago today that I - completely by chance (or not!) - spotted Rosie and Rufus badly emaciated in a town park. If you've follwed the story of Rosie's rescue you will know that I went back every day to feed Rufus and make sure he was making good progress too.

He was also badly emaciated (you can almost count his ribs in the image above) but compared to Rosie he was actually strong - he was like a lightning rod whenever there was food - and I therefore decided to let him stay with kitty mom and come back to check on him every day. He kept doing well until about 10-12 days ago when it appeared kitty mom had gone astray (or whatever else happened) and he began to just sit in a forlorn and pittyful state underneath the dumpster on the street outside the park. I had rescued him twice from the huge dumpster because he would jump into the dumpster to search for food, but each time they had been emptied he was too small to make his way out. Also he had developed a serious diarrhea - it would literally run out of him whenever he ate. He'd begun to give off the feeling that he was loosing his will to go on and I frankly couldn't get the image of him out of my mind whenever going to sleep at night. 

Again - I knew there was only one thing to do - so last Sunday evening I brought him back home. And don't get the idea that I just travel around looking for kittens to rescue. As a matter of fact I've seen and heard so many kittens in the area where Rosie and Rufus comes from that I've had to develop a kind of "don't look, don't listen" state of mind. As I've heard so many times "You can't rescue them all" - but my approach is that of some lovely words once uttered by Gandhi. When the Indien people were suffering due to the British laws imposed upon them making it impossible for them to live, a village elder asked Gandhi; "Will you help us?" and Gandhi (knowing they were up against impossible odds) answered; "What we can do we will do."

The day after I rescued Rufus he went to the vet for an examination. The vet told me that had he not been rescued he would not have made it beyond a couple of days with the severity of his diarrhea. He actaully spent 5 days at the vet in the attempt to restore his digestive system. It's gotten a lot better but he has still some days to go. As you can see in the image above he is just a little hearttrob with a well kept secret - a darling white belly. Now it is Rufus' time to learn to be a kitten again - just playing and goofing around, having a soft place to sleep and not having to worry where the food will come from.