I have never been a cat person.

I never will be a cat person.

But in to every life a little cat must fall...

Mine came from my roommate Buzz. It was Oct 6th 1985, and roommate Buzz asked if I thought it would be OK if we got a cat.

"A cat...? Hell no. Why a cat?? What good are they? They walk around with an attitude the size of Kansas - they don't come when they're called, they scratch up furniture, they bring you dead rodents, and they defecate in the house... Yeah, sure - a cat. That's a great idea....

"Oh, it wouldn't be THAT bad...", Buzz responded.

"It wouldn't be that good either", I replied.

That's where the discussion pretty much ended. Until that night about 11:30 PM when I came home from a date. I walked into our tiny apartment kitchen and opened the refrigerator. As I reached for the milk, something brushed against my leg. I jumped across the room.

"YAHHHHH ! What the...!!"

"Myoww."

There, on the not particularly clean linoleum floor, stood a grey, tan and black striped Tabby of about 8 weeks.

"Myoww" he said again.

"BUZZ!!!" Buzz's room was right off the dining room. I heard him let out a laugh.

"Cute little guy, isn't he?"

"It wants my milk..."

"Well give him some."

"You know Buzz, I've been thinking about getting a large male German Shepherd lately... think if I just sort of BROUGHT ONE HOME, he'd get along with this... this... What's his name anyways?"

"Jazz", said Buzz.

"Hi Jazz." I said. The little kitten looked at me inquisitively. He had the words "long term proposition" written across the top of his head, and something told me it was to be an expensive one as well. "If you get that job with US Air, the cat goes with you", I bellowed from the kitchen.

"Absolutely - No worries mate!", came the reply.

Cats aren't good for much, but it didn't take long for Buzz and I to discover they were good for one thing. If you are a young bachelor in need of meeting young women, simply procure yourself a small cat, (they generally come cheap), and write your telephone number on his collar. Then simply release him into the great outdoors, and let the cat do the work. Kittens the size of your TV remote control look inherently lost, and since guys, with the lone exception of a rogue few like Buzz, don't care anyways, it will always be a female that calls to report she's found it. Generally they are between the age of 18 and 33. Which worked just fine for us.

Ring, ring... Buzz and I used to dive for the phone.

"What? You've found a cat? Oh - that must be Jazz....Cute little rascal must have escaped again... Sure, I can come pick yo... er..., him up... be right over..." Buzz met one girl through Jazz that he dated for over a year. We should have named him "Jim" after the old game show host of "The Dating Game."

Eventually US Air did call, and Buzz moved to Baltimore to take up a job and a schedule that did not suit itself to cat ownership. I had known Jazz far too long to simply take him to the SPCA - even us non-cat people have a little bit of heart for the most imperfect of God's creations. Besides, my future wife would have disowned me. "It won't be that bad", she said.

She sounded just like Buzz that first night in the kitchen.

Meanwhile Jazz had become a full blown Cat with a capital "C". We didn't know it when he was young, but what we had on our hands was a "Maine Coon Cat". A large tiger of a "house cat" that had very little "house" about him. He had jowls like a Lion and the disposition of a Cougar. Jazz used to chase squirrels through trees to catch them. He stared down large dogs as though they were mice. He ate from his bowl about once a week - the balance of his fare coming from his skills as a bird hunter. But what he saved in cat chow he more than made up in Vet bills.

He came home one morning with half his back paw missing, the apparent victim of a steel trap or perhaps a close call with a car. We were able to put him back in form for just over $500.00 and about as many hours of changing bandages and applying balm. Ever tried to apply lotion to the sore back foot of a half wild Maine Coon Cat? It wasn't pretty. The only advise I can give is, "Ears flat - get back."

This was followed by a serious case of "ear polyps." I took him to our vet, Jesse Webster. "Well", Jesse said. "The good news is that its simply a case of 'felinious earpolipiouos'"(Or something like that.) "The bad news is that its so far down in his ear canals next to his brain that I can't do the operation - at least I've never done one like it before - you better take him to Virginia Tech."

Tech sounded expensive. "Gee whiz, Jesse - how much will that run..."

"Around a thousand dollars, I'd say..."

And you've never done it?"

"Nope."

"Got any good books?" I said, eyebrows raised.

Jesse was with me. We went to his office and dug up some articles on lower tract cases of "felinious earpolipiouos." It didn't look that hard on paper.

"I tell you what", he said. If you let me learn this operation on Jazz, I'll give you a deal."

"Sold", was my immediate response.

Jazz came home 3 days later with half his head shaved and an incision that ran from one side of his head all the way around to his throat on the other side. A small plastic tube ran in one ear and out the bottom of his neck. If large dogs had ever thought of messing with him before, they weren't about to now. He looked like "Frankencat." Which is what we called him, until Jesse removed the tube and his hair grew back several weeks later. The final cost of the operation was half what Tech would have charged, but he had nevertheless become a "four figure cat."

"Ouch", said Buzz when he came in to visit and saw Frankencat convalescing in the corner.

"You talking about the bill or the cat?" I replied.

"Yes, he does look like Bill the Cat", Buzz responded referring to the popular "Bloom County" comic strip of the day.

"Cute little guy isn't he?" I said, quoting Buzz from that first night in the kitchen.

Shortly after the operation, we moved to our new house a few blocks away on Stanley Ave. Jazz had always lived outside, and even though my wife gave him a ride over to our new place several times, he invariably returned to roam the area he had grown up in.

But every year or two he has come back to visit us, slipping through the picket fence in our back yard and wandering down to the garden. In years past he would let us pet him and would occasionally eat a treat of some kind from our hands, but now he remains aloof in the upper reaches of the yard when he comes. He walks slow and square and proud in that large cat like manner - apparently just wanting us to know that he is still around and getting along O.K. He is almost 17 years old now.

I suppose Jazz has become a non-people cat as much as I am a non-cat person, but our relationship over the years has been a very good thing for both of us. I have an appreciation of such animals I would have never discovered, and whenever we see him we have a strong sense of satisfaction, knowing we have been able to help him out along the way.

And I think that he too has developed a heart for one of God's more imperfect creations.

Pretty cool cat, that Jazz.