One Small Life

Ask any cat owner. The sound of a hairball about to be expelled is singularly unforgettable.

I put down my makeup and ran to the kitchen for paper towels, then following the sound, dashed into the half bath in the guest room. Murray was crouched on the bathroom floor, tail switching, yowling in that full bodied and earthy tone reserved for projectile vomiting and trips to the vet. He was glaring at the corner of the vanity and the wall, fiercely intent and aggressively postured. Behind him, the dogs were barking wildly and for a second it was like walking into a madhouse. Making my way through, I scattered the dogs and reached for the cat who had seemingly turned to stone - he protested violently, went rigid in my arms and continued to make an ungodly sound, I could feel his wailing like vibrations as he pushed to get free. Depositing him in the hall and closing the door behind me, I located my glasses and returned cautiously to the bathroom, having realized along the way that this was no ordinary incidence of hairball attack. Even with my glasses I could see nothing out of the ordinary in the small room until the slightest movement caught my eye - moving closer on my hands and knees, I discovered a tiny chameleon burrowed into the fibers of a dustbroom leaning against the wall. It was frozen in place and camouflaged but alive. I sat back on my knees with a satisfied feeling of mission accomplished which rapidly turned into mission impossible as it dawned on me that I would have to rescue the small creature and rescue called for capture. After several minutes of considering the various possibilities, I decided to try a shoebox, coax the tiny invader into it, cover it quickly, and make a run for the back porch. All of which seemed like a perfectly good plan until the black dog hit the guestroom door like a battering ram and a small army of companion animals broke through and joined forces to separate me from my escape route.

Times like this try my patience. One at a time, I dragged, carried, coaxed and tricked the animals out of the guestroom, found a shoebox and put it over the chameleon, turned it over to insure he was inside and quickly put the cover on. I set him free on the back porch with a warning and watched him disappear into the shrubs, there one minute and gone the next. It was only one small life saved but it had been worth it.