Four cats; Seven birds; Nine dogs; and a host of other animals. Some people cannot help themselves.
They tend to collect animals, and such people that do that are commonly referred to as “hoarders.”
Some would call me a hoarder. At the time of this writing I possess 11 dogs and 13 cats. All the animals I
have are either strays or rescues. I have delivered scores more to the local animal shelter, only keeping
those that were deemed as “unadoptable.” Even so, I have delivered non-adoptable animals to the shelter
with the full knowledge that the poor creature would be euthanized. I will do that with an animal that is
obviously too sick to survive anyway. It is a hard thing to do, but you cannot save them all.
But I am not interesting in talking about me here. No, I want to tell you about another such hoarder …,
someone about whom you should know. Now I am not advocating the practice of “hoarding.” Whenever
possible, strays and vagabonds should be delivered to your local animal shelter, which is best equipped to
deal with them. One should not undertake the task of finding homes without the help of the animal shelter.
A respectable animal shelter will see to it that the adopted animals receive all due shots, and the shelter
will see to it that each animal is either spayed or neutered. There are enough stray dogs and cats in the
world – not to mention other species – that if every pet owner in this world would spay or neuter his or her
pet, the world would never run out of prospective pets. It is a shame, at the very least, that more people do
not get their animals “fixed.” Far too many vagabonds have been produced from unwanted or otherwise
unintended pregnancies.
But we do have hoarders, and hoarding is not necessarily a bad thing. There was such a person once who
hoarded animals. Like me, this person let his animals live in the house with him. He had dogs and cats and
birds and animals of other species, and as I have already mentioned, this person had at least nine dogs,
four cats, seven birds, and a host of other species.
This person had a cat that he wore around his neck like a scarf as he went about his daily work. He had
another with whom he played hide-and-seek among the cabinets and grandfather clocks of his house. He
had one such cat that would actually sleep with one of his pet birds! Nearly all of his animals were of mixed
breed or were otherwise strays or rescues.
This person had a special collar made for one of his cats. Later, the cat disappeared and was never heard
from again. It was thought that the collar was so special that someone absconded the cat so as to acquire
the collar. Neither the cat nor the collar have been seen since.
Even though keeping a Mockingbird as a pet was considered illegal where he lived at the time, this person
nonetheless kept one as a pet. Sure, he was a lawbreaker for keeping the bird, but how can you not like
such a person?
There was another bird that would eat right from this person’s mouth! I don’t think I’ll say anything more
about that.
Our person received a gift from a friend in the form of a raccoon. It was intended that the raccoon be
included in the Thanksgiving meal, but this person of whom we speak could not bring himself to do that, so
the gift became a pet. Yes, our person of the moment had a raccoon as a household pet!
Our friend also had a black bear as a household pet; two kangaroos; twin lion cubs; an antelope; and other
various exotic animals.
There were dogs, of course. There were a couple of chows; a collie; English bulldog; English sheepdog;
and various other kinds of dogs. The dogs stayed in the house with him, and were generally allowed
access to any part of the house that the family was allowed access. The dogs loved to run up and down the
stairs; they would disrupt family affairs and important meetings in the house; they would do things in the
house that dogs are wont to do from time to time. The dogs kept the housekeepers quite occupied.
A rare and eccentric person, our kind friend was. But he was more than that. Many consider him one of the
great men of our time. He is one of the most quoted men of the 20th century. Here are a few of his famous
sayings:
“… the chief business of the American people is business.”
“Collecting more taxes than is absolutely necessary is legalized robbery.”
“I have never been hurt by what I have not said.”
“If you see ten troubles coming down the road, you can be sure that nine will run into the ditch before they
reach you.”
“It takes a great man to be a good listener.”
And of course, the following: “Any man who does not like dogs and want them about does not deserve to
be in the White House.”
He would know. After all, he was the 30th president of the united States. And as Calvin Coolidge once said:
“You can't know too much, but you can say too much.” So, with that I shall shut up.
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