Writing essays is often hard work mentally for me. But all things taken together, it is pleasant work, particularly when the essays are completed.
In recent months, I have been writing essays about politicians. That is sordid business. So now I am going to give myself a treat by writing about people I like, including our old friend, Shannon P. Catt.
Just as a start on friendly feelings and people I like, when I look toward New York City, Guido Bocciola the owner of L’Aiglon Restaurant comes to mind as a first class friend. The same goes for Jorge Alonso, his Cuban born bartender, and Roger Delacriox, the Frenchman who became Guido’s partner after a time. L’Aiglon has been gone from the scene after the AT&T Company took it over probably 20 to 25 years ago so they could build a new Taj Mahal on Madison Avenue. It has been a long time, but I still miss Guido and the people who worked at L’Aiglon. They were very good to me.
When New York City enters my imagination, I often think of that Hungarian born entertainer, George Feyer. Simply put, I think George Feyer was probably the finest entertainer ever to sit at a piano. I knew George Feyer from the 1950’s until the 1980’s when age more or less interrupted his career. He was a special friend.
Now rounding out this trio about which I intend to write at the start, is Shannon P. (Pest) Catt, a fellow who called this house his home for nearly 15 years. As the title of this piece suggests, Shannon and the rest of the people who lived in this house were special pals.
Guido, George and Shannon are dead now. It is time for this old essayist to recognize their contribution to the happiness of my wife and myself. If Guido and George were here now, they would follow my remarks about Shannon very closely to get a foretaste of how they will handle the laudatory stuff that will come their way as soon as I tell you about our old pal, Shannon.
When Shannon died in December 2000, Judy and I had a notice of “In Memoriam” published in The Item of Millburn, New Jersey. (It is attached.) The first sentence of that memorial piece identified Shannon as, “A beloved lap cat who gave his family love and devotion without reservation for nearly 15 years.” You see, regardless of Shannon’s posturing, he was totally a lap cat. At an old chair out by the garden, he was a lap cat. On the back porch and in the kitchen, he was looking for a lap to crawl onto. In the living room or the recreation room, he held true to form even watching silly commercials on the television set. Upstairs he was working on Judy who was using her computer or he was on the top of my desk, walking on the paper that I was writing on saying, “I want to be held.” In the bedroom, he had the whole king sized bed to get snuggled in. The reason I go to such lengths to establish that he was a notorious lap cat has to do with his view of himself.
Shannon never ran away, but he pursued Zelda, a female cat up the street. He was proud, perhaps to the point of being vain about it. He strutted, he posed and he looked down upon lesser mortals who were not of feline bloodlines. Society started with Shannon at the top rung. He viewed the world as his oyster. He was a man about town. I believe that if the old song and dance man, Maurice Chevalier, were a cat, he would be Shannon. Or to put it another way, Shannon considered himself to be the Maurice Chevalier of the feline world.
But that was only the half of it. To the rest of the world, human, feline and canine as well as other wild animals, Shannon wanted to assume the persona of a fierce fearless fighter. His swagger was something to see. He bore the scars of battle proudly. On his photograph, you will notice that the tip of his right ear is missing a piece. I believe that old Shannon clearly regarded himself as the Rocky Marciano of the cat world. The comparison to Maurice Chevalier and Rocky Marciano were well deserved tributes in Shannon’s eyes. When there were no female cats around, Judy and I would exclaim about his muscles and speed and we would also comment favorably on his handsomeness. It made no difference that this praise was coming from humans; Shannon welcomed the attention, but he regarded the adulatory remarks as being his long delayed due. As fierce as he was, Judy and I wanted to stay on Shannon’s good side.
Shannon has been gone now almost 17 months. After his death, we could have left him at the Summit Dog and Cat Hospital where Doctor Dorney and his veterinarian daughter, Doctor Kay, promised to look after Shannon until the crematory came around to pick him up. We said absolutely not. His body was in a cardboard box which we drove to the Abby Glen Memorial Park in Lafayette, N. J., some 35 miles from here where the crematory was located. It was a cold, snowy, December day. We waited till the Abbey Glen people did their thing and at the end, we came home with Shannon’s ashes in a metal container. Although the old guy is gone, we can’t keep his memory from our minds.
When I shaved, I used an electric razor. It makes a small noise but that was enough to cause old Shannon to come running to the bathroom. He would leap to the counter top where he could watch me in the full length mirror. Alternatively, he would turn his back to the mirror and look at me. I always pretended to give him a shave while the razor made it’s buzzing sound.
When Judy was working on her computer, Shannon would nose around until she got the thought in her mind that he should be picked up where he could see the screen and the keyboard. Sometimes he failed to nose around; he just leapt to Judy’s lap. One way or another, Judy worked around Shannon so everyone was happy.
Shannon was a good leaper. When he wasn’t leaping up in the bathroom to get a shave or to the computer, he would jump to the top of my desk. If I were writing, which is what I do at the desk, old Shannon would inch closer until his front paws were halfway down the page I was writing on. I used to think if he is that hard up for affection, maybe I’d better hold him, which I did.
He often would wait until one of the cars was parked in the garage. As the door opened he would leap up to the floorboards and begin to walk around being careful to look out all the windows. He was not afraid of cars as Judy had suggested early in his life here, that we take him to the post office and other errands so that he would not associate the car with going only to see the veterinarian. He liked the new Chrysler 300M’s.
Shannon’s penchant for entering parked cars got him in some serious trouble. One Friday afternoon, I came home and unloaded the car in the garage. I slammed the door. Well we didn’t see Shannon on Friday night nor did we see him on Saturday. We looked everywhere but not in the garage. Sunday came and went with no cat so we assumed he had run away from home. We were out of places to look.
Monday was a rainy day. Ray Gallo, a painter, was working on the house in the bedrooms. When he arrived, I intercepted him to tell him he should bring his station wagon into the vacant space in the garage. As the painter was unloading his equipment, he asked me why I kept a kitten in my relatively new Cadillac. The kitten was Shannon, of course.
I suppose on Friday afternoon, he had crawled into the car and I unwittingly slammed the door. When I took old Shannon from the car, there was no wet spot or anything else. I don’t know how that happened. I fed him and told him how sorry I was. Old Shannon just went about his business that rainy Monday with no recrimination against me. I learned a lot about forgiveness from that episode.
In the living room, when I sat down and put my feet up on a hassock, old Shannon would come in and walk on my legs until he found a spot to lie down and snooze for a while. I was glad to have him.
In the rec room, Judy and I have large chairs where we read and watched television, particularly the news at 10PM. Shannon would come down to see what we were doing. First, he would get on my lap for his pets and he might even hang around for a few minutes. Then he would go to Judy’s chair and stretch out long ways beside her and relax. Judy’s large chair was where Shannon slept until about 2AM or 3AM, with which he would come upstairs and sleep in the big bed. We ordinarily start for bed a little after the 11PM news comes on. If Judy hung around her chair too long, Shannon would let her know, by body language, that he was ready for his first shift in bed. When we left the rec room, old Shannon didn’t say good night or anything else. He fussed around until he got things in the chair the way he wanted them, and then it was off to sleep. We always said “Good Night” to Shannon; he never returned our greeting.
Shannon had an egalitarian trait. If we were out by the garden, on the porch, in the kitchen, in the living room or in the rec room, Shannon always seemed to make sure he spent time with each of us. It was no accident; I am certain he had it planned in his mind. That was one more reason to like the old guy.
For more than 30 years, I kept a garden which measures about 25 feet each way. There was an old collapsible rocker lawn chair that had been there for years. When I tired of spading or hoeing or harvesting, I would sit in that old chair for a breather. Shannon would almost always miraculously appear from nowhere to sit on my lap. If he was lolling in the shade by the garage, Judy would often say, “Shannon, Pop is taking a recess,” and here he would come for laptime and petting. Sometimes around June or July when the plants grew to around twelve inches, he would hide in their shade. When recess time came, the plants would shake and old Shannon would emerge sometimes with leaves on his head.
Our advisor on cat conduct, Gayle Woodman, said that from what she saw of Shannon, he would never leave home. And why should he? He had a big buffet in the basement, with water and a toilet, and illuminated by a 25 watt bulb day and night. In the kitchen, he had dry snacks and water so all his basic needs were cared for. Judy kept perhaps a dozen or more cans of cat food in reserve for future feedings. She contends that she would hold up a can of cat food and tap its sides with her fingernails and that Shannon would indicate “OK” or “to hell with that stuff!” So no wonder he wouldn’t leave home with all that service.
Judy also used my bench for brushing Shannon. Sometimes she would put him on the bench, but if she was not prompt about it, he would leap from the basement floor to the top of the bench. As Judy brushed him, old Shannon would sort of doze off still standing on his feet. He greatly liked to have Judy brush him.
Shannon and I had a period or two of illnesses. On one occasion, he had to have an abscess removed from his lower body. Oh man, he was a sore old guy. We have a large plastic tray around here. I suppose its intended use is for serving several drinks or for meals, but it was pressed into service when Shannon was sprung from the hospital. Judy put several towels on the tray for Shannon to lie on. At the hospital, the Vet put Shannon on our litter bearing food tray so he did not have to stretch himself. On the way home, I held the tray as level as I could to prevent pain to the old cat. At home, I sat in my chair with my legs up on the hassock and Judy brought the tray next to my lap. Shannon quickly got the idea. He left the tray under his own power and settled down on my legs which was one of his all time favorite lounging spots. When he eventually wanted to get up, Judy brought the tray along side my legs and Shannon transferred apparently with minimum pain. Until he recovered, the tray was his elevator.
I was simply returning Shannon’s favor. There were at least three occasions where I had been laid up and had to take bed rest for a few days. On each of those occasions, Shannon would come lie beside me in the bed for an hour at a time. He would stay with me as sort of a guard for most of the day. I was comforted to know that Shannon was looking out for me. So the litter bearing tray was well deserved for a faithful friend.
During my stays in Overlook and Morristown Hospitals, I eventually achieved private rooms. They all had bulletin boards for birthday and get well cards. Shannon’s picture, the one with the mangled ear, was tacked on all those boards. I wish he would have been permitted to see me.
We rarely go out on Saturday evenings for dinner. Instead we dine on fresh fish and a bottle of good wine while we listen for a couple of hours to CD recordings. This way we can dine and hear good music. Well, old Shannon liked to hear the concerts, particularly in cold weather. Not long after the first notes of the music were heard in the house, old Shannon would show up to be held and snuggled. After he finished with me, he would go to Judy who held him upside down like a baby and people would take turns scratching his belly. What a life he had and good music to go with it. He never showed interest in our food or wine, so I suppose it was the snuggling and the good music that entertained him on Saturday evenings.
One more final memory sticks out in my mind. The first winter he lived here, that was 1986-87, there was quite a bit of snow. When I would try to shovel it or snow blow it away, I found old Shannon, trying to catch snow flakes as they fell. He was only eight months old and had never seen snow, but I’m here to tell you, he really gave those falling snowflakes a strong workout.
During much of Shannon’s life, Judy and I took vacations in the winter months. The idea was to kill January, the cruelest month. At the beginning, Shannon stayed at home with Gayle Woodman visiting him twice a day to feed him and to comfort him. There were times when ice on the roads made Gayle’s job difficult.
So Gayle concluded that with us gone, Shannon was lonesome. She ought to know as she is around animals all the time. So she proposed that Shannon should stay while we were gone with a friend of Gayle’s, Sage Lewis Jones. In military terms, he would be attached to Sage for rations and quarters.
Sage was very good to Shannon and the arrangement worked very well. He even slept on her bed. Old Shannon had girl friends all over.
So you see, Judy and I carry strong memories of Shannon some 17 months after his death. It all started at the Summit Dog and Cat Hospital early in May of 1986. At that time, the Dorneys, who ran the Hospital, took in strays collected by the animal control officers of surrounding towns. Judy said that what this house needed was a cat so we went to see Mrs. Dorney who sort of played matchmaker between the cats and their prospective human owners or servants.
Mrs. Dorney kept the stray cats in cages. Families were kept together if there was a family. Shannon was there with his mother and some of his siblings. As we looked over the cats, this one guy acted as though he wanted to mix it up with me. It was a gross mismatch because his weight was less than a pound, mainly because he had only been in this world only about a month. But he said to me, “Put’em up Buster.” So we told Mrs. Dorney that we’d like to look at this budding Rocky Marciano. We moved to another room and this cat, soon to be named Shannon, wanted to play. So there after a few minutes, the die was cast. We wanted to take this less-than-a-pound kitten home with us.
Mrs. Dorney said we’d have to get clearance from her husband, the Vet. When Dr. Dorney weighed our cat, he said that no cat could be placed until it weighed at least a pound and our guy was short a few ounces. So we agreed to wait until the Friday before Memorial Day, 1986 to go back to see about the cat. We told Mrs. Dorney that his name was going to be Shannon. She was surprised that we had picked out a name so soon, but the Irish name perhaps pleased her as the Dorney clan probably traces its ancestry to the Emerald Isle.
So on that Friday before Memorial Day, Shannon got weighed and passed the one pound test and I held him in my hands – not my arms – as we headed for Judy’s car. As we left the hospital, one of the teen-age staff members said to Shannon, “I hope you have a nice life.” I told her that’s what we planned to give him.
Judy drove a German made BMW at the time. I apologized to Shannon for the rough riding BMW and explained that later, he could ride in my bump eating Cadillac all he wanted.
When we got Shannon home, he pretty much acted as though he was at ease. He explored all the tight spaces behind furniture, not to hide, but simply for the sake of exploration. A few days after he arrived here, we almost lost him in a foolish move. We took him to the garden and let him walk around. The tall grass tickled his belly and he was intrigued as to why that was the case. Remember, he had never been outside before. In an instant, he went through our neighbor’s picket fence. He was not leaving home; he was just exploring. Judy called him and went to pick him up. She got no resistance from Shannon and we were much relieved to have him back in our care.
For all the years Shannon lived here, he more or less came and went as he saw fit. I cut a hole in the garage door to accommodate a cat entry system. The door to the house in the recreation room had a bungee cord attached to it so that Shannon could come into the house from the garage. So as Gayle Woodman says, why should a cat like Shannon ever leave.
Well, good things don’t last forever. In the fall of the year 2000, Shannon seemed to miss a beat. He wasn’t his old self, so we took him to see Dr. Dorney. The Vet said that Shannon was an “elderly gentleman” which told us that he didn’t have much longer to be with us. Shannon’s health would stabilize for a few days and he would eat better than he had. And then, his health would decline.
In December 2000, we again visited Dr. Dorney to see what we could do. We told Dr. Dorney that Shannon appeared to be on his last legs. When the Vet took Shannon into the examining room, Shannon leapt down from the table and pranced around. Some last legs. At the conclusion of that examination, Dr. Dorney said he strongly suspected that cancer was working on the old cat. He referred us to a hospital in the far northern reaches of New Jersey, the Veterinary Referral Center in Little Falls, New Jersey. That town is a long way from Short Hills and is getting close to the New York border. That Center had the most sophisticated diagnostic tools available on the East Coast or anywhere else. We were to see Dr. Renee Al-Sarraf. She is one of two oncology specialists in New Jersey.
This was late in December. So we bundled Shannon up in a blanket and towels and drove for what seemed to me to be an endless distance. The Veterinary Referral Center is a tough place to find but after two or three tries, we found it. The Vets there were very nice to Shannon and to us. They told us that the hair on his belly would have to be shaved for a test, which they did.
After a time, they brought Shannon back from their workroom and the news was pretty bad. The diagnosis was pancreatic cancer which had spread to his liver. They made it clear that this condition would not improve and that if Shannon were kept alive for any length of time, pain would be his fortune. The people at the Center were very decent and compassionate. They would have preferred to deliver good news, I am sure, but we had a feeling that cancer was working on our old pal.
We didn’t get lost coming home, but the distance from Little Falls to Short Hills is pretty substantial considering the traffic. What Judy and I failed to realize was that Shannon had gone perhaps four hours or more without a bathroom break. On the way home, proud old Shannon couldn’t wait any longer and he got the blanket and my trousers wet. I petted him to let him know that it was our fault for overlooking his needs.
Shannon tried the best he could, but the cancer was gaining on him. He slept in our bed for long periods at a time. When he didn’t get up from the bed for quite awhile, we made the decision to carry him to Dr. Dorney expecting that visit to be his last. Dr. Dorney and his daughter, Dr. Kay, also a Vet, said that we were right about Shannon’s sufferings. It was bad now and it would get worse. So the Dorneys euthanized Shannon. He died in a peaceful way. His life ended in the same Hospital with the same Vet as at the beginning of his life.
Like many animals, Shannon knew it was his time to go. Don’t ask me how they know, but they do. If we had let Shannon out of the house after his Little Falls diagnosis, I am fairly certain that he would have disappeared to die. Animals are like that.
So Shannon knew it was his time. The Dorneys agreed. And we had no choice but to accept the inevitable. We think Shannon was a mighty fine fellow who brightened our life for nearly 15 years. Judy and I are indebted to Shannon for all the cheer and love he gave to us.
He lived a fairly long life for a cat. We drove his body to the crematory because he would have done the same thing for us. Upon our return from that cold December trip, we had the local paper publish a notice of his passing. It says that this old “lap cat gave his family love and devotion without reservation for nearly 15 years.” There followed the fourth and final verse of the “Minstrel Boy,” a traditional Irish rouser.
In a previous essay, “On Mortality,” I said that “For Shannon, I will share the ‘Minstrel Boy’ as his epitaph as he is a good Irish cat. He is a good and loyal companion.” That essay was written on May 22, 2000 when Shannon was still very much alive. Now nearly two years later, I think that he ought to be memorialized also with the traditional Irish song of parting. When Irishmen and Irishwomen meet at homes or in bars, they often sing at the end of the evening, “The Parting Glass.” There are two verses. The first one goes this way:

O all the money that e’er I spent
I spent it in good company
And all the harm that e’er I’ve done
Alas, it was to none but me.
And all I’ve done for want of wit
To memory now I can’t recall.
So fill to me the parting glass
Goodnight and joy be with you all.

Shannon was mighty fine company. So after you’ve sung the “Minstrel Boy” and “The Parting Glass,” perhaps you’d like to salute old Shannon for a life well lived.
E. E. CARR
May 10, 2002
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The idea of taking pets on errands to get them comfortable with cars seems brilliant — I wonder why I’ve never heard of other people doing that? Our dogs definitely knew when it was vet o’clock and Bridget in particular was good at running and hiding behind the couch when she figured out what was going on. Taking her to the post office with us sometimes could have done a lot to build trust!
Anyway, this is one of the sweeter essays on the site, and I really enjoyed it. Just a man reminiscing about his cat; I don’t have much else to add.