Cat Wants a Wife

For many years, I made ends meet in Kinshasa, Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo) by providing health care for expatriate pets. I saved the actual note above, stained and blurred, to illustrate a funny story in Grains of Golden Sand:

"Spaying and neutering were the most requested surgeries for pets in Kinshasa. Because no invasion of the body cavity is called for, castrating tomcats is a simple procedure and I had been doing it for years. But spaying females was abdominal surgery and this was another thing altogether. By 1994, I was asked so often for this operation that I knew I had to make the effort to master the technique.

"Fortuitously, the American Embassy Recreation and Welfare Association, AERWA, was swarming with wild cats. As a favor, I agreed to trap them. I caught more than 30 cats and euthanized the weak and sick ones. A few males were neutered and released, and I “practiced” spaying a half-dozen females. They all survived and were released back at the club. I then spayed two of the institute’s cats and a few for a doctor friend. We were in the neutering business. Of the 60 cats and a dozen dogs that I spayed, all survived. A compulsive note-taker, I kept an anesthesia record of each operation, total surgery time, and even the type of sutures used.

"Surgery added new dimensions to my knowledge of medicine and rounded out our clinic’s ability to help animals. My earnings permitted me to cover personal expenses and even save for travel home once a year. I kept a few letters from satisfied “customers,” and my favorite is the felt-penned explanation that arrived one morning with a yowling tom in a pink plastic airline crate.

"Good morning, how are you? I’m sending you “Mimo,” his vaccination card is with you. He needs to be “Castré.” I don’t know how to tell ya in English, he wants a wife so he’s feeling hot. This morning he wants to kill himself from my verandah. Since yesterday 20:00 I’m not giving him food. If you can make the operation for him today I will appreciate. If not, please keep him until tomorrow, I send food, because I’m afraid he’ll kill himself.

"It was requests like that, so easy to “fix,” that made me realize that caring for pets was a contribution, no matter how minor, to the overall health of the restricted expatriate existence in Kinshasa. After all, who else could have prevented lovesick tomcats from committing suicide by leaping off high-rise apartment balconies?"