Weeks with current fosters: 9, 3
Days without hissing: 0 (Putting the new kids in their place)
Days without sneezing: 0 (We’re “waiting out” their colds)
I’m very tired. These kittens have boundless energy and they’re constantly expending it, rolling around scrapping with one another, biting a tail or an ear, chasing a toy on a string, wrestling with a mouse that rattles. Then they eat, and poop, and play some more, and finally crash for an hour or two before someone wakes someone else up with nip or a swat and then all you can hear is the sounds of kibble scattered all over the floor — and Marlo, breathing hard through her stuffed-up nose. There’s no keeping up with them; there’s barely containing them.
Buster, by contrast — by necessity? — is more reserved. He’s older now, all of 21 weeks (approx.) and in an in-between place literally and figuratively. Jenny and Clem ignore him, and the kittens find him fascinating, and he them in turn, but instead of just watching them through the door of their enclosure he watches and hisses when they approach. Or when they ignore him. Sometimes I wonder if he’s hissing to get their attention, like, Hey, you, you should know I don’t like you. Meantimes he plays very hard with wand toys but only on the ground, really. He’s a jumper, but for the most part he keeps to the floors. He very recently started spending time on one of the kitchen stools (usually Clem’s domain), which is a literal big leap from the play mat he lounges on during the day.
It’s odd to have a ground cat, a Bush Dweller (™ Jackson Galaxy) in a house that’s seen so many kittens who prefer to regard the world from a great height. Buster’s not averse to using the skyway (the track of carpet-covered shelves Kas installed that cover a little more than two walls of the apartment), but he’d rather be on the floor, or maybe the couch after supper to clean and snooze.
I’ll say again, I’m tired. A fact about fostering kittens is that it multiplies all the good and all the tedious things about having companion cats: You’re not mixing up one or two dinners, you’re mixing up seven, and three have different dietary requirements and preferences you need to observe and four eat four times a day, and the recycling bin fills up with tiny empty cans and sometimes you can’t tell the difference between the smell of fresh food and the smell of fresh poop, and there are six litter boxes that want cleaning anyway, and once you’ve squared away the big kids the tiny ones are full of just-eaten energy and knocking over their food dishes, and then you repeat half of it in half an hour because of course there’s second serving. I would make some noises about this being analogous to childcare but that’s probably not fair to parents, who can’t just leave their charges unattended for a few hours and have to worry about things like school districts. At least, as I measure and mash up to the properly smooth consistency a precise blend of canned food and meat log for Clementine, I can console myself with the fact that I never have to send a cat to college.
We just have to get these kittens adopted, which in the face of their endless colds and Buster’s, I don’t know, unique Busterness, feels like a rather faraway goal. Are people applying to adopt him? Are we best sharing the wonders of his personality, the way he skitters away making a play noise not in fear but to ask you to romp with him? Are we communicating the delight he takes in chasing a spring toy about the apartment, the tentative gestures he makes toward playing with Jenny and Clem, how he winds himself around Kas’s legs and purs and purs when he’s feeling sweet? Should we be settling in for another Long-Term Foster? We’ve had them before; this time last year we were a month into what would turn into a nearly seven-month stretch with two kittens, Piper and Kiwi, and sometimes I still miss their little faces. We’ve had Buster for nine weeks and counting now. Maybe he’ll be climbing the Christmas tree in another four. Maybe he’ll be snapped up before Thanksgiving. He’s a sweet boy with so much love to give whoever takes him home. I feel like I’ve been saying that for weeks now, but repetition doesn’t make it any less true. He’s a darling kitten who deserves a family who’ll shower him with love and make him the center of attention. We do our best but there’s only so much attention to go around. (The reason for which is, yes, entirely our faults, consider this recognized and agonized over.)
I realize worrying about it won’t solve anything, but to be honest it’s not just worry; as I said, I’m a little tired. I’m a little tired of worrying. I wouldn’t go so far as to call it burnout, but these days I’m very anxious and sometimes I look at all these cats in my house and I think, I’m not even meeting my own needs, how on earth am I supposed to meet yours? And there’s not really an answer, except to keep trying, which I guess is the answer to How do I meet my own needs, actually? and whatever other questions fill me with dread and keep me swilling drugstore-brand non-habit-forming sleep aids at night.
You can sleep better with a couple small creatures curled around your lower half, that is true. And it’s only been three weeks but I can fall asleep to the kittens’ 11pm jubilee, which they observe without fail every night after their supper and evening doses of antibiotic.
I’m trying to do some good in the world. It’s a small amount, I know, but I think it counts some. It’s got to count a little.