Your New Best Friend

She's now ready for adoption. The staff named her Melanie. I visited her yesterday, and the change is incredible: clean, stronger, and healthy (for new readers, background on this with photos is here). She's still purring away loudly, and really wants to get out of that cage. If you live in the New York area and you're looking for a friend for the next fifteen years, please consider it. Call ahead before you go to be sure no one's taken her yet. The contact info is here.

When I visited yesterday, I saw two previously stray kittens in the cage next to her. They were about six inches long and not more than a week or two old. I asked the staff why each had a raw, stubby tail. The explanation: when they're not obsessing about Britney Spears or aspiring to build their neighborhood's best meth lab, some of our nation's high-achieving, ready-to-compete-in-the-global-economy youths are fond of tying newborn kittens by the tails to the back of bicycles then dragging them from behind while racing. The staff also told me that a frequent variation is chopping the front paws off cats so they can't defend themselves, then putting them in a room with an aggressive dog that hasn't been fed in a few days (if anyone knows where this is happening, give me a heads-up -- I'd love to pay a visit to some of these punks). If a nation's identity depends in part on how it treats animals, what I saw and heard was both depressing and encouraging. If you saw these animals -- clearly grateful for the care they're now getting, but perhaps also wondering what type of monsters we are -- I think you'd agree.

The veterinary center that's been treating Melanie takes these animals in from the street, gives them top-notch medical care, and keeps them until someone adopts them -- as opposed to almost all shelters that kill them fairly quickly. The cost is often many thousands of dollars per animal. It's possible only because of financial support by The Artemis Project, a New York City animal rescue organization. The website is here. Artemis is run by a woman named Dorian Rence, a musician for the New York Philharmonic (photo and bio here).

I've never held out a tin cup here. But if you've enjoyed visiting and want to return the favor, please make a tax-deductible donation to Artemis. The work it does in partnership with Lincoln Square Veterinary Hospital is great and very much needed. Again, the website for donations to Artemis is here, and the website for LSVH (where the animals rescued by Artemis are kept and cared for) is here. Let me know if you make a donation. And if you're in the area, stop by and visit some of these special critters.