ABSTRACT: For some reason people seem to take a weird delight in dredging up something that occurred in my past, but that's just it; it's the past and not who I am now.
CONTENT:
I don't think there is anyone of us who hasn't had some incident in their life that hasn't exactly been "stellar." The incident may have occurred in the past, and that's exactly what it is, the past. It's not happening now, it's done and over with. Yet, somehow, for some reason, people decide and want to dredge up a past incident that occurred in someone's life as if it were still occurring now when it isn't.
You might say this is a follow up article I had written here at Yahoo! Voices back in August 30, 2007 which clearly describes that past incident in my life that occurred prior to 2001; in fact, it actually started in 1993. It was an incident that was created in effect by my mother and of which got out of control very quickly, and it deals with an over pet population of cats and, yes, could be classified as a "hoarder" situation. However, this is precisely why, so many years later, I'm an animal activist/advocate, and among many things stress the need for people to spay/neuter their pets in order to not create the same problem. I'm writing this article now to be publicly and openly on record that the past incident no longer exists. Although I provided a link to that article above, I wish to describe and give a thumbnail sketch of what happened in my past, though by no means a short one.
First up, I've had cats since I was five years old and only had one cat from 1962 to 1968. In the ensuing years some more cats would come into our lives, and on average my mother and I had about five or six while I was a child, teen, young adult and beyond. Then in 1992, my mother and I had a total of nine cats, including and unfixed female we found as a stray and took her in that year. Nine cats is still not a totally outrageous number and "doable." Throughout the years, ever since 1962, it had been our policy to always spay/neuter the cats. I asked my mother to please spay the new female kitten when she came of age. She kept saying that we need not bother as we weren't gong to get anymore cats.
Some months passed and a neighbor wanted to give us a male cat he had found in the streets. I firmly insisted over and over again that, no, we couldn't take in anymore cats, but both my mother and the neighbor did sort of a guilt trip with me saying that it's only one more cat. I gave in, and in came the male cat. It didn't take long to realize that this male cat also wasn't fixed, so now we had a pair of unfixed cats. Now I was on my mother's case to get at least one of the cats fixed. I wasn't able to personally go to the vet and get one of the cats fixed as I was dealing with a disability issue of anxiety disorder with agoraphobia, and while not completely housebound, I had my limitations of where and how far I could travel, and our vet was quite a distance away. My mother had no such problem, and she most definitely had the financial means to take one of the cats to be fixed; she didn't. I think you can guess what happened next.
On April 6, 1993, six kittens were born, three males and three females. Right off the bat, I started asking my friends if any were interested in adopting one of these kittens once they were old enough. No, no one did. Rather than dump the kittens into a shelter, we decided to keep them and my mother's idea was to get the male kittens fixed first once they came of age, but oops, missed one, and yes, more kittens were born, and more and more and more, until it completely spiraled out of control. We did try and get the cats fixed as soon as we could, but it had gotten out of hand so fast.
By 1996, I had to completely stop my work as a photographer. Despite my anxiety disorder and agoraphobic issues, I was primarily working at home and had often sent out my photographic work by mail to companies. Also, I was developing black-and-white film and prints, and would set up studio type shots at home, but now I had to stop everything as I was now spending all my time keeping things in order you might say, and yes, forever cleaning, cleaning, cleaning our place. My mother didn't do a thing, not even wash dishes, while here I was not only cooking all the meals, doing all the "normal" chores, but also keeping things under some kind of control with all the cats involved.
In 2001, my mother and I got our first eviction threat due to all the cats we had. Naturally we got legal help, as well as some animal advocates to help us out. One animal advocate had ties with the news media and our "story" was picked up, not only in newspapers but also by local news stations, even Jeanne Moos of CNN came to our place and did a feature on us. The local ASPCA mobile van also got involved and also came to do a spay/neuter of any and all cats that weren't already fixed. Due to the news media coverage, it encouraged people to adopt our cats. It became a virtual Grand Central Station with people coming over to our apartment and willing to adopt our cats, unfortunately not enough. We did, however, win our case, and a stipulation was made in court that we could only have two cats. There was one major problem, however. As our story became a "memory." People stopped coming by to adopt our cats and we still were way over the number of allowed cats in our home.
From 2001 to 2006 I lived in chronic fear of being found out that we did indeed still have more than two cats. In 2002 I became computer savvy by self teaching myself at my nearby library and a whole new world opened up to me. You see prior to that, the only shelters and rescues I was aware of was ASPCA, Bide-A-Wee, and of course the NYC Animal Care and Control. With the computer I now found out there were virtually hundreds of other animal rescues and groups in the NYC area. You might say my campaign began and I contacted as many animal rescues and groups as possible in the NYC area and practically on a daily basis, I would say I was contacting at least fifty, yes, fifty rescuers and groups. Folks, we're talking four years, four years of my reaching out and asking for help of any kind on an almost daily basis. The result? No one, but no one helped during those four years.
My fears came true in March of 2006, when yet again my mother and I were threatened with eviction. By this time, in that year, I had a lot going on. My mother had been diagnosed with Cancer in June of 2005 and her health was rapidly declining, not only her physical health but mental health as well. I had to find a good lawyer, which I thankfully I did, and I still continued my efforts of reaching out for help with our cat situation. I also had to contend with court appearance with my mother. Bottom line however, none of the rescuers I had contacted during those fours years helped out, even with the real threat of eviction upon us. Ironically the rescuers that did wind up in helping out tremendously, mainly ones in upstate New York, who by other rescuers networking had heard of our situation weren't even ones I had initially contacted. Also unfortunately, the NYCACC came into the picture, as our lawyer was kind of antsy pantsy to get the cat population down to only two, however, not many were surrendered to them, more were transported to the rescuers upstate New York. If it sounds like I have sour grapes against all those rescue groups I reached out to for four years, so be it. In my opinion they could have been helping all along.
By Friday, May 19, 2006 the cat population was down to only two cats, the original number set in that stipulation back in 2001. The court case however dragged on until October of 2006, and by that time I was on my own, as my mother had hospitalized for what would be the final time on August 11th. She was in a medicated induced coma until August 27, 2006 when she passed on. By the way, I did win the case and wasn't evicted.
There is another issue I wish to bring up tied to the 2006 eviction issue however. Since the news media had been so helpful back in 2001 in bringing the story to light and encouraging people to adopt our cats back then, I thought to myself, maybe I could get news coverage again to help out and encourage people to adopt the cats once more. I reached out and contacted two local newspapers who did arrange and came to our place and did an interview with my mother and myself. The story seemed to have caught on, but not necessarily in the manner I expected.
One day in April of 2006, when I was coming home after being in the library to still continue using the computer there to reach out for help, I found one of those sticky notes tacked onto my front door. The note said that he had read my story in one of those local newspapers and was interested in doing an interview with me and to call him back. The note was from a reporter of the New York Times. I thought wow, New York Times? To my mind that was like hitting the jackpot. So of course I called him and arranged for an interview for him to come over to my place. You have to remember my prime goal in contacting the news media initially was to perhaps once more get people interested in adopting our cats.
What turned out however with that interview was nothing short of a disaster and a farce and went an entirely different direction. For some reason, the reporter became fixated with my spiritual beliefs. For the record I AM a follower of the pagan/wicca path, but he seemed to turn the entire interview more on my beliefs than the real story that needed to be told, that about the cat issue and getting people interested in adopting them.
The article which did come out in early May of 2006 was nothing short of something that should have been in the National Enquirer. About the only thing he got right was my name. It's a wonder that the reporter didn't say that I was expecting an alien baby from the Andromeda Galaxy. Here's the gist of it. First off the bat he mentions me as the "witch of Elmhurst"….Okay I could deal with that since I am a follower of pagan/wicca beliefs so yes I am a witch and yes during that whole time of the court case I was doing protection "spells" or prayers. Wouldn't most people of any faith want some kind of "prayer" help? But then it goes on: "The witch happens to be Melanie Neer, 50, a student of the principles of Wicca and Harry Potter."
Harry Potter? Harry Potter? What kind of idiocy is that? Yes I do happen to be a fan of the Harry Potter books and movies, but give me credit folks, I know it's not a religion! If I still hadn't been involved at the time with the court case of eviction already back then, I would have loved to have sued the reporter for defamation of character. I actually did contact him to tell him and basically told him off about his so-called news reporting he had done and that it was totally out of line and false, but he told me that it was the editor that changed things around. Oh really? Give me a break, the editor wasn't there doing the story, he was.
Another thing in his article is that he mentions my mother sitting on the sofa wearing "her overcoat and a pair of thick boots". Why he brought that up I don't know. Yes, the "interview" took place in April, so yes, it was warm. However my mother always felt cold. It could have been 90-degrees and she still would feel cold, this the coat. As for the boots? Those were the ONLY shoes she had. During one of her hospital stays they kept changing her room around. For some reason she had a "fetish" to try and leave the hospital and eventually resorted to placing one of those wristbands on her so if she walked past a certain point, the alarms would go off. With all this changing of her room, they lost her clothes including a very expensive pair of Nikes, so the only other shoes were her boots. Since she had rather deformed feet getting shoes for her was difficult.
Since May 19, 2006 I have indeed continued to remain having only two cats. For the record and I want to get this straight, I did adopt another cat on December 1, 2012. My one of two cats, Pyewacket passed on April 19, 2010, still however, that does mean I only have two cats to date. Does anyone think I'm stupid? Does anyone think I'm so stupid that I would risk another possible eviction issue? I don't even dare adopt one more cat than the specified two allowed. It's also a purely logistics issue. Since I'm on my own now and do receive disability benefits, why would anyone think I could even afford to have a lot of cats? Also, if anyone questions the number of cats I have, I have people who can testify that yes indeed I only have two cats now, I also will freely allow anyone to come and see for themselves that I only have two cats. I have a photo here taken maybe three years ago during Christmas time that clearly shows I don't have a lot of cats.
I do rather find it amusing that when people do a search on me, they will dredge up that "infamous" article written by that NY Times reporter and slam it in my face. People seem to focus on the past negative incident that occurred, yet by-pass all my positives, such as my numerous articles I've written or even my photo website that I have to display my photography work. Only just today, someone once again dredged up the past, and sadly I have a feeling it won't be the last time.
So bottom line, if anyone wants to continue to dredge up my past situation, a past that clearly is not valid now, and making people think it's still in my present. Watch out. I can sue you for slander, libel and defamation of character.
Sources:
Life experience
@Melanie Neer-Photos included for this article are my personal collection of my two current cats and a photo of my apartment
Photo of Ouija
Photo of Kissy
Photo of my apartment at Christmas time
Previous article about what occurred in the past:
Living With A Pet Hoarder article
Previous article about my experiences about my past situation:
Living With A Pet Hoarder~date August 30, 2007
Photo image for the Living With A Pet-Hoarder article was from this website
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