Having made this cross country jaunt eight or nine times over the past 16 years, I knew it would take three full days, allowing for two nights in motels to recharge. Plus, I’d arrive a day or two ahead of the truck carrying the cars so I could be there to meet it and help with the unloading, all the while, solving the issue of how to get the cats to the new home.
I was hoping for a cheap Mopar minivan but eventually found a ’91 Mazda 323 for $1600 that passed the usual inspection; if it’ll run for 40 minutes without crapping out or making angry metal sounds, it’ll usually go for 40 hours too. But I was really sold on the hatch back. I filled it with a big blanket, numerous pillows, a litter box, one of those deep-well water bowl/food dish combos that doesn’t spill and figured I was good to go.
All I needed to do was round up the cats. Cookies was easy. Being a fat little thing, she didn’t put up much of a fight and stayed put once I got her in the car and (carefully) slammed the hatch shut. But the other three were a problem. Let’s put it this way, of the four cats I was hoping to transport in the car across country, one made it (Cookies) and three escaped. That’s the bad news.
The good news is the three escapees got loose right there in my El Monte yard before I even started the car, and not out on the open road – say during a gas stop in Texas or Virginia. A deal like that would force you to make the kind of decision NASA would face if an astronaut got sucked out into space. Do you compromise the rest of the mission for a single crew member? Do you wait around for an hour, a day, a week, for the panicked feline to return to its senses – and the car? Ground Control to Major Tom, your circuit’s dead.
Thinking ahead, I put collars on each cat plus a six-foot leash. The idea was that I’d be able to control them this way and maybe tether them to the car during gas breaks so they couldn’t bail. Not so. Ever see that newsreel footage of the nice little kitty cat running around the news man’s leg? It wraps the leash tighter and tighter until it maxes out, then kitty sinks all twenty claws simultaneously into his leg. It’s great stuff.
I wasn’t a total pin cushion, but my arms were covered with claw marks before too long. It seems that cats - even the ones that know you real good and purr contently under normal circumstances - revert to primal survival instincts when you try to put them in a closed car, even when it’s for their own good. So there I was grabbing the cats one by one and tossing them in the open driver side door. I’d get three inside then when I opened the door for the final cat, one or more would escape through the door gap and we’d start all over again. We went on like this for over an hour. One of the sights I’ll never forget is Lux kitty – the one with a serious independent streak - bolting down the street at top speed – a six foot fluorescent pink Wal-Mart leash trailing her like some kind of crazy snake. More about that leash in a moment…
After over an hour of this game, I was exhausted and the cats – except for fat little Cookies who was asleep in the car – reached the point where they no longer fell for the “here kitty, kitty” trick. They knew what was coming, they wanted no part of it and they’d run if I so much as walked in their direction. Houston, we have a problem. I decided I’d come back later for the three stragglers. Here I should point out that I am working on a TV project that’ll have me living in LA for an extra three months, so the return strategy was a solid plan. Plus, my neighbors saw my struggle and agreed to feed the three cats until my return to get them.
Cookies and I hit the road in the Mazda and had an uneventful cross-country trip. As a plus - to me at least – she got so upset she became constipated. The biggest drama came during an overnight stay at a Motel 6 in Texarkana. When I woke up, ready to hit the road, Cookies was nowhere to be found. After literally searching every inch of the closed room I lifted the mattress and box spring. No Cookies, but I did hear a weird clawing sound. A little more investigation turned up a hole in the bottom side of the box spring where she ripped a hole in the box spring and crawled up inside. Now I know why motels have a no pets policy, they sure can do a lot of damage. I reached in there and found a clump of bloody hundred dollar bills. Okay, that’s a lie, but I did get hold of Cookies, who finally cooperated and got into the car with no more trouble.
The crappy little Mazda amazed me by covering nearly 400 miles between fill ups and delivering 33 mpg at 78 mph. I did need to keep an eye on the automatic transmission fluid level. There must have been a pan gasket or seal leak as it would lose fluid after a day of driving and the transmission would begin to slip. Fortunately, it’d only take a half quart to restore function. Cookies and I made it to North Brookfield in one piece and I only spent $261 on gasoline for the entire trip.
I put Cookies in the care of my girlfriend, parked the Mazda in my new driveway and flew back to LA a day later to continue working the TV gig. Now here’s the sad part of the story. When I had a few hours off, I returned to my old home to give the kitties some food until I could trap them, haul them to the vet for health certificates, then toss them on an airplane as live cargo for the trip to Massachusetts. My neighbor told me he feeds two of the cats regularly and they seemed to be doing well.
But as for Lux – the one I last saw running away with the six foot leash – it seems she got caught in a fence and the leash choked her. She died. The other two cats slipped their collars during my failed capture efforts so their leashes were no hazard. Not so for poor Lux. There’s a moral here and we all know what it is. Actually, choose your own moral as several come to mind. So let us pause to remember Lux, a Mopar-loving cat if ever there was one (that’s her sitting on the Hemi in my old kitchen). Rest in peace Lux, rest in peace.
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