Elvis Has Left The Building

Today was the day, after necessary scheduling delays on both mine and my daughter’s part, for Elvis to move in with mom. We met early this morning to transfer Elvis and his gear, more than my grandson arrives for an overnight with, from my truck to my daughter’s SUV. I felt like I was betraying the poor cat. He’s been here for almost a month, has warmed up, become social and sweet, and I stuffed him a carrier so he can be a experiment in hoping to give a demented woman a greater sense of purpose. And while there are many examples and studies showing exactly this sort of relationship between pet and patient being beneficial to the well being of the patient, none of those patients were my mother, and none of those pets were this cat.

When I arrived at mom’s apartment this evening, she answered the door saying, “There a cat here.” She said, amongst other things:

• My daughter told her a shelter needed help fostering him while they worked on finding him a home.
• He was available if my husband and I wanted another cat.
• She was concerned because he hadn’t eaten. She also expressed this to my daughter multiple times.
• She expressed surprise when I said my daughter was in the community, and how could that be as mom hadn’t seen her granddaughter. I said, “Mom, didn’t she bring you the kitty this morning?” Mom’s reply was, “Oh, that’s right!”
• Mom said she needed to figure out a good name for Elvis. I waited 7 minutes and then pointed out there was a tag on his collar. “Mom, look! Here’s a tag with his name. It’s Elvis!!” Mom said, “Oh, that’s right!”
• After returning from the evening’s program, mom reiterate that Elvis could ‘go at any time’ if I knew anyone who wanted a cat. This was very discouraging. Later my kiddo said, “It’s been a day. She hasn’t fallen in love with Elvis yet.” Deep breath.