Somehow We Have Kittens

So now Christmas is next week, and I am going to Johannesburg to K and her husband A, their five-year-old delicate fairy SB and two-and-a-bit-year-old chunky little boy S. I am driving myself, something which has everyone in a tither in case something happens along the way. But I have a great, impeccable Lexus, and I love to drive. The journey takes between five and six hours and the road is a wonderful double highway all the way. What can happen?

I have been dreading the advent of Christmas without F, in K's house; he was such a familiar figure there. But now my dread has faded. Probably lost somewhere in the inevitable excitement of gift wrapping and gift choosing. I have a respectable amount of gifts to take with me. This is a generational step - the first time we will have celebrated Christmas with our daughter, at her home. I say "we" because F will be with me. I know that now.

My one worry - and there is always something - is that one of my cats has a wound on her left cheek. I discovered it three days ago and took her to the vet. She is now on antibiotics and has a brown ointment applied three times a day, which she hates. Afterwards she spends some time licking her paw and washing her face, removing all the ointment and any skin which may be healing so that the wound (an erupted abscess from a cat bite) is wide open. I have virtually two days to heal her and I can't leave her like this. My friend, who is going to come into my house in the late afternoons to feed the cats, will not be able to medicate her, nor would I expect her to.

Lexi is pure charcoal grey, short haired and long boned. I bought her as a kitten from a pet shop I had wandered into, emerging with both Lexi and Teddy, a very pretty tortoiseshell. This was some three months after F had died. I love cats but F would not contemplate having a kitten. Somehow after his death I managed to acquire two. Oh, and for years we have been looking after a tabby, Puck, passed on to me by K as her dogs were making her life miserable. Puck is on the elderly side of middle aged, very affectionate, housebound and somewhat simple minded. She detested the kittens for about a year but can now meet them face to face with matronly disapproval but there is no more bad language.

Anyway, I have Lexi's face to worry about. I am amazed ar her gentleness as twice a day I hold her and put a pink pill into her mouth. Her expression is one of utter disgust but she never thinks to scratch me.

I will call the vet and ask him if I can use mercurochrome; or an antibiotic powder, instead of the ointment. This morning the wound is not quite so raw. It looks clean, but I will not apply the ointment.

I love to heal. Once when M was a little boy he had a nasty cut on his foot, which I virtually washed clean and mercurochromed to perfection. I can understand how a doctor feels; it's something in his very hands.

Just hope I can heal Lexi in time, before I leave.