Happy New Year! Hope you all had a relaxing and enjoyable holiday, and wishing you all the best for 2015. For me, 2014 had its challenges, but Im feeling good now and looking forward to being able to spend more time on The Panda Project this year. In particular, there are three projects that I am working on: 1. A long-form written piece -- hopefully a book -- about Joe, the homeless Sarnia cat who was shot 17 times with a pellet gun in February of last year. In case you dont know the story, miraculously Joe survived: he lost an eye but is otherwise well. Two individuals were arrested and charged with animal cruelty; they have pleaded not guilty, and as a result a trial will be held, likely this year. I continue to follow the progress of this case through the court system, and plan to attend the trial and write in depth about this story once a verdict has been reached and the current publication ban is lifted. 2. Abena, the woman who looks after colonies of homeless cats in my neighbourhood, lives in a nearby apartment building which has more than its share of social issues: poverty, elderly tenants requiring assistance, crime, and animal abuse and neglect. I have recently learned that government agencies -- some of whom I work with -- have decided to provide much-needed additional resources to this building and its occupants, and I hope that they will be open to a having a discussion about how better to improve the welfare of the buildings pets. 3. One of the unexpected, and very welcome, benefits of my having attended the sit-in at City Hall last year was my meeting and becoming friends with Chris Caple, the man who organized the sit-in and devoted literally thousands of hours to make it the success it was. Chris works as a Web designer; he also happens to live about a five minute walk from my home, and is an animal lover with three cats of his own. Now that I am busier at my own job, I can afford to pay Chris to develop a website for The Panda Project -- a website that I believe will provide much more flexibility than a simple Facebook page can. The website will, of course, be fully integrated with social media, so my hope is that it will add to, rather than subtract from, The Panda Projects reach. Ill be meeting with Chris this coming weekend, and am very much looking forward to getting going on this. I will of course keep you updated on these projects as they develop. Once again, I truly regret not being able to respond to your comments and questions: I really miss the connection and conversations, and Im hoping that once these projects a little more developed -- and perhaps with the aid of some new volunteers -- that will change. In the meantime, as always, I thank you all so much for your continued support and encouragement. Ill close by sharing about a wonderful Christmas gift I received. As you may know, there are three homeless cats -- Ben, Beauty and Kitten -- who have been living on our street for years; Panda was the fourth, but he was more of a loner, whereas these three have been bonded from day one. Even if they were comfortable enough with humans to be adoptable --they arent -- they would have to be adopted as a set which, given their ages (Abena estimates theyre each about 8-10) seems unlikely. So Abena and Stewart and I try to make their lives as comfortable as possible, providing them with three meals a day, fresh water, and straw-filled shelters; last winter, we purchased a heated mat and placed it in the protected side entrance to our house, and Ben, Beauty and Kitten spent much of the winter huddled together on it, especially during the horrendous ice storm in late December 2013. And other neighbours are always stopping to ask about the cats or to drop off wet and dry food. My family are all animal lovers, and when were together were always sharing stories about our cats, so I was shocked -- but not really surprised -- when I saw the Christmas gift my nephew James made for me: a miniature house, complete with entrance, framed Plexiglas window, and a shingled roof, which perfectly fits the heated mat (my sister secretly got the measurements). It even has its own address -- our house is No. 222 -- and a little sculpture of a cats face over the entrance. (James asked me to say that he regrets that he will not be able to take any requests for similar houses!) As time goes on, I feel that, as far as their lifestyles and behaviours go, the differences between our indoor cats (Geena and Gerard, both rescues) and Ben, Beauty and Kitten are becoming less and less; and to me this reinforces my belief that every homeless cat needs and deserves a home. I hope that by continuing to raise awareness, this dream will one day become a reality. - John (PS From left to right in the photo from the fall: Ben, Beauty and Kitten.)
Posted on: Sun, 04 Jan 2015 23:00:28 +0000
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