Socializing

Fun cat tree

After I had Tarquin checked out at the vet to make sure he didn't have any nasty diseases he could pass along to Lucy and Brilly--AKA "the girls"--I kept him in the spare bedroom for a while. The reasons for this were twofold. One: he was a kitten and kittens just have a knack for getting into everything. Hey, what's this? Oops, did I break that? Sorry...And two: I wanted to take my time with introducing him to the girls. While the group of feral cats all seemed to be one big, happy family and everyone got along, it isn't usually that easy to introduce a new cat to existing ones. As an aside: the ferals were so accommodating that oftentimes one nursing mom would watch another mom's brood for a while. Even cats need mommy me time.

In Tarquin's room, there was a neato cat tree where he could scratch and climb. There also was a couch and a treadmill (that nobody used). And countless cat toys, food, and, of course, a litter box. I would go in several times a day to talk to him and pet him. Sometimes I'd take a book in with me and sit and read while he got used to me. One day I opened the door and Tarquin was on the cat tree. He saw me and hissed. He immediately acted contrite--"Oh, sorry, old habits die hard. I promise I won't hiss at you any more."

Hanging out in my room

Of course in no time at all, Lucy and Brilly figured out I was harboring another cat in the spare room. They'd be on the other side and the language used was not very nice. Growling and hissing and general complaint registering. Poor Tarquin. He'd look over at me when the girls would be carrying on and seemed quite shocked. "Wow. Do they eat with those same dirty mouths?"

Finally I decided enough time had passed to let them all do a meet and greet. We let Tarquin roam around the house. He seemed pretty bold and fearless, but Lucy and Brilly were in a tizz! He'd try to go out into the big room with the wood-burning stove and Lucy would hiss and bat at him. So he'd retreat. Brilly--the Brave *sarcasm implied*--basically let mom handle things. She sat under the dining room table and growled a lot.



I was amazed that Tarquin didn't press the issue with Lucy when she swatted at him. Lloyd said "He
had a mom. He knows about being told what to do." I still kept him in his room at night and when we weren't home. To, as the vet said, cut back on the destruction factor.

Lucy (l) and Brilly on the infamous couch

Tarquin soon learned that Brilly was more fun to tease than Lucy. I was sitting on the couch, with Brilly at my feet and Tarquin on the couch cushions above. He'd reach over and tap her. She'd do a combined hiss and snort (very ladylike) and swat at him. Then he'd repeat the process. All was fun until the cushion started to collapse and Tarquin rolled on top of Brilly. He moved pretty fast away from the source of the hissing and snorting (she snorted on the inhale, so it was a constant hiss, snort, hiss, snort).  I think he thought it was kind of funny.

Oh, and exploring was fun for Tarquin. He discovered bathtubs (couldn't figure out any good use for them), beds (fun to hide under), and TVs (they made a lot of noise and flashed a lot). It also seemed hard for him to fathom having this much space that needed to be investigated. But even with those hissy broads, it seemed a lot warmer and safer than living under the deck. And he soon decided the weren't as scary as raccoons or dogs!

Naming

Tarquin, AKA Mr Fangers

I can't claim to have named every cat that showed up in our yard. But we did name quite a few. As I mentioned, Tarquin's mother was Greta. His litter got Cubs names--Rondelle (after Rondelle White), Sammy (Sammy Sosa), Gracie (Mark Grace), E.Y. (Eric Young), and of course Tarquin/Delino (Delino DeShields).

A trio a few years later I named Tinker, Evers, and Chance--the great Cubs double play combination. A solid gray male was dubbed Steel. And a couple of the tuxedo cats, who looked like they had Fu Manchu moustaches, were names Fu, FuDa, and Fu Two. I rescued two newborns that someone, possibly Greta, had abandoned under our porch. They needed to be bottle fed, and the Humane Society took them in. They became Ferdinand and Isabella.

Mimsy sniffs my hand--she was still living outside here

Finally, just before we had to move--because our landlord was going to demolish the house and build a duplex--I rescued a little tortie that I named Mimsy. Her name came from a line in Lewis Carroll's "Jaberwocky"--All mimsy were the borogoves. I was on a "Jaberwocky" kick--one of my two old tabby cats was named Brilly, from the line: 'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves, Did gyre and gimble in the wabe. Mimsy had had two litters of kittens by the time she was one, and only one kitten had survived. He was a grey tabby, whose fur looked a bit like a Rorschach blot. He would jump on the screen door and emit a long, drawn out meow that sounded like a roar. So he was named Rorschach--Rory for short. Mimsy and Rory now live with us, and sorely miss their brother and uncle Tarquin.

But about naming Tarquin. While we didn't dislike the name Delino, I was afraid the baseball player Delino would be traded from the Cubs, and I wasn't sure I wanted a cat named after a traded player. We thought about Honus (as in Hall of Famer Honus Wagner), but it sounded more like a dog name than a cat one.

Finally Lloyd said: "How about Tarquin, as in the Thomas Babington, Lord Macaulay poem 'Horatius at the Bridge.' I've always liked that poem. And he started reciting it:

Lars Porsena of Clusium,

By the Nine Gods he swore

That the great house of Tarquin

Should suffer wrong no more.

By the Nine Gods he swore it,

And named a trysting-day,

And bade his messengers ride forth,

East and west and south and north,

To summon his array.

He might have even stood like a mighty orator as he intoned his poem. Hmm, I had to admit, the name Tarquin was ok. "You might be on to something," I said. "And you know what? There was a Monty Python Tarquin--Tarquin fin-tim-lin-bin-whin-bim-lim-bus-stop-f'tang-f'tang-olé-biscuitbarrel--so I think that's a grand name."

From thence, the little black cat with the white smudge on his chest was known as Tarquin. He also became the cat with many nicknames: Tarkilly Darkily, Tarquin the Dark One, Tarquinius, Tarkie, Tarks, Tarkle Puss, and, because he had very long fangs, Mr Fangers.

That Tarquin--he was one cool cat. 

Kitten taming

Learning to sharpen claws. Probably Tarquin's littermates

Tarquin's littermates and the tagalong kitty

When we trapped the five kittens (Tarquin's littermates plus one older kitten who made the bad decision of tagging along with the little kids), I was socializing cats at the Naperville Humane Society. I had been laid off from my writing job at Arthur Andersen and decided cat socializing would lower my blood pressure and help out cats who needed homes. In addition to our supply of cats and kittens in the back yard, we also had a family of ground hogs. There was mom and four babies nipping in and out from under the deck. Lloyd named the big one Dozer--short for Bulldozer. We've gave them some lettuce to keep them away from our garden, but they did manage to knock over my potted begonias and dash it to pieces. For some reason the cats and ground hogs cohabited without any angst or bloodshed. 

After Lloyd trapped the five kitties, we kept them in a shed in our back yard--it had been a kid's playhouse, so was much nicer than a crummy old shed. I would go in there with them with toys and food and just sit with them and try to get them used to being handled. Eventually they got a bit more trusting. When playing with a cat toy, one touched his nose to my finger! 

Tarquin at the back

Tarquin (then known as Delino) had a little smudge of white on his chest, which said made him look like he was wearing a vicar's robe. He also had one white toe on his rear paw and some white under his arms. When he made eye contact with me, there was no fear in his eyes. He somehow knew I wouldn't hurt him. I could pick him up, sit on my lap, and purred his acceptance of the whole event. The others, not so much. One I called Rondelle (he later became Caesar when my friends adopted him and Sammy) was the next-most friendly. Friendly is probably not the best term to use, as my first foray in picking him up resulted in him panicking and then launching himself back into the cage. The littlest one, Sammy, (later to become Marco) just hissed, glowered, and looked pissed off. The remaining two, Gracie, the gray kitten, and E.Y., the tagalong kitten, eventually went to live with my friend's friend on a farm in Iowa. 

Probably Tarquin looking at cat toy

After I decided to adopt Delino/Tarquin, I took him to Vetsmart to test him for any diseases. At the time Lucy and Brilly (a mom and kitten I had adopted back in 1989) were the resident house cats. Had to make sure our little orphan wasn't bringing any nasty diseases into the house.

At Vetsmart, the vet commented on what a nice cat Delino/Tarquin was. The receptionist wanted to weigh the kitten, so I had to take him out of the carrying case. I figured we'd either

be sliced to bits, have a wild cat running amok through Petsmart, or it'd be ok. It was ok. He sat in my lap the whole time, and in the exam room behaved just like all my cats have done: Sat on the towel, as close to the edge as possible, pressed up against me. When I told the vet how wild the others were, he was amazed.

My friends who took Sammy/Marco and Rondelle/Caesar did not have such an easy time. They were little ninja kitties: Armed and dangerous. They'd hiss at them all the time, and didn't want to be picked up. Why Tarquin came around is a mystery to me. That's why we always called him the Mensa kitty. Smart, and figured out being a house cat was an altogether good thing.