Last Wednesday my little cat, Hobbes, went in for a teeth cleaning and infected tooth removal. She was eerily quiet on the way to her new vet, a little veterinary hospital in Renton. When I pulled into the driveway and turned the car off she began to meow pitifully. After checking her in (the cheery if not vapid receptionist kept referring to Hobbes as a ‘him’), I left my cat to the whims of anesthesia. Josh picked her up later, finding her hungry with a bandage on her shaved paw, and learned that Hobbes has Periodontal disease. Basically it means her teeth fall out randomly and according to the vet, she is missing multiple teeth! For example: both of her back molars are gone, a quirk we never realized when we took her in six years ago. They removed another back tooth and her bottom fang, slathered cement on her remaining teeth in an attempt to keep them secure, and clipped her toenails.

The shaved paw is really the only reminder that she underwent any sort of procedure (I’m assuming it’s where the IV needle went in). Her voracious appetite has not been affected, however, and we’ve had no trouble hiding her antibiotics in a mound of tuna fish (only tuna, she refuses pills in regular wet food). She even held still when we squirted pain meds down her throat and has spent many leisurely hours sleeping on Josh’s new chair. All of this is sad evidence that our cat is getting old–2008 is her twelfth year–and dental diseases are par for the course. 1996 is special because it’s the year Josh and I met and our future cat was born. Despite her graduation to senior cat status, her mandatory blood work came back normal and her feisty attitude remains.