I know you’re out there, and I wonder how you would feel if the following happened to you.
I’m sure by now the word has gotten around that I wrote a children’s book, “The Mis-Tails of Mooshca and the Little Wekiva River.” But that’s not what this is about, just the cat part. The main character in my book, Mooshca, happens to be a domestic cat.
I had the misfortune of learning a very sad thing over the past few days. There are many people out there concerned about our environment but they just don’t like cats. I have been chastised several times by well-intended individuals that a domestic cat should not be the heroin of my book as cats are not kind to our wildlife.
I even had the good fortune to receive several emails from members of the Native Plant Society of Florida. They thought my book was wonderful but had wished my main character had been an animal native to the Wekiva River, not a cat.
One person suggested I replace my cat with a native Wekiva River Basin umbrella species of cat which, by the way, is a puma or a leopard. Not really something I feel children can relate to as easily as Mooshca the cat, and I don’t want our young ones thinking it’s safe to approach a wild cat.
Another suggested a turtle? The most disturbing part was she tried to cover her dislike for domestic cats by claiming she owned a cat. Her cat was quite happy locked up in the house all day with a litter box, which I’m ok with but here’s the distressing part; the cat had been declawed.
Got me to thinking: Do we really love our cats if we declaw them? Perhaps we are just afraid grandma’s antique chair might not fare so well if our cat has all its toes. Maybe cat owners feel they won’t miss their front toes once they are gone since they still have the back ones. It hard to tell what the reasoning is behind this act of declawing, cats can’t talk, much less defend themselves. Am I getting off track? Sorry.
My goal is not to save the world all in one day; it was to write a book fostering education and understanding. While we’re on the subject of saving our planet, maybe today’s the day to think about how we treat our domestic animals.
This is Elaine, and let the sun shine in.
Elaine Huffman
Author, Publisher, and Environmentally Conscious (oops Animal Lover)
