Kittens left to die in an earthen jar

A neighbor suggested their mother must have dropped them there. I disagree. A monster in human form did it.

Before I start with the story, I just want to say that this newsletter is a merger of two newsletters that had been languishing for months. To my surprise, people were still signing up. The first few were, well, I thought they were flukes, you know? But the first dozens… No fluke. Inspiring and humbling. Thank you. From hereon, I will write daily (that’s my goal anyway). But only in this merged newsletter. I hope you stay for the stories.

I’ll start with the story of the four kittens but, first, you have to have a clear view of the earthen jar into which they were dropped.

That jar with the handle. The photo was taken almost 16 years ago but that jar, minus (part of) the handle, is still by the front door in a standing position. We’ve never planted anything in it. We’ve never filled it with anything. It’s just there because, truth be told, it just looks like it belongs there.

So, that’s the jar. Now, about the kittens.

For two nights, we had been hearing kittens meowing nearby. We knew they were kittens because we had cats and kittens for over a decade, and we can tell the difference between the sounds that kittens make and the sounds that adult cats make.

So, two nights they were there. My younger daughter, Alex, wanted to locate them but I discouraged her. Number one, feral cats can have rabies. Number two, I did not want to encourage fantasies of adopting stray cats.

On the third day, we heard them again. It was just after lunch. In broad daylight, Alex could no longer be dissuaded. She stepped out and came back in tears. She had peered into the jar, saw four kittens piled on top of each other and, somewhere beneath them, what looked like a dead frog.

She just wanted to give them water. She understood we weren’t going to adopt them. Okay, I said, lay the jar on this side so the kittens could crawl out. No need to touch them but she wore a rubber glove anyway. And add a pinch of sugar to the water, I told her.

Two kittens came out after a few minutes.

And then, a third. We’re still waiting for the fourth to crawl out, if it is still able.

My husband was fuming. Like I said, we kept cats for over a decade and we knew cat behavior. Imagine that jar being there and we had cats who bore kittens litter after litter, and not one landed inside that jar.

The kittens were dropped there by a mammal with two legs and two hands, and left there to die — away where their mother will never find them.

Or is it malice directed at my household? Possible. Not all neighbors get along, and we’ve made a lot of complaints about karaoke noise.

Meanwhile, I messaged the Barangay (for non-Filipinos, the barangay is the lowest political administrative unit in the government) and asked for assistance. We don’t want the kittens to die there, we don’t want to touch them because of rabies, and we definitely can’t kill them because that’s a criminal act, and because we’re no cat killers. It’s been over an hour and I still haven’t received a response.