The Kitten |
One morning, after we had finished taking a Squadron photo, a few of us heard an very faint sound....the sound of a very frightened kitten. We investigated and soon I found a tiny little kitten hiding behind a door. This little fella was obviously lost and looking for Mommy. I approached slowly in an attempt to help, but this just drove our little friend back behind the door. |
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Here I am attempting a rescue. The kitten was having none of this nonsense, and there was no way I was going to get it out. The kitten can be seen through the glass. A few of the guys stopped by, curious to see what had caught our attention. They informed us that they had seen the mother cat and her kittens at several locations around the base. She seemed to be moving them around often. Now it appeared they were living in the basement of our headquarters building. It was decided we would back off and see if the kitten would come out on its own. |
After several minutes, Mom appeared. She gave us a dirty look from the top of the ledge. She obviously was not pleased that we considered this entertaining. The kitten took a few tentative steps out from behind the door. The little fella was meowing up a storm, and probably just wanted to get the heck out of there. But a bunch of weird looking dudes in desert uniforms kept staring and taking pictures. We backed off a little bit more. Eventually, under the watchful eye of Mom, the kitten came out and moved inside. Just before he bolted in, he turned to us and meowed. It seemed to be a "back off, you losers" kind of meow. As soon as the little kitten was inside, Mom jumped down and ran in to tend to her flock. The activity over, we went back to work and began another fine day in Iraq. We never saw any of the cats again. I hope they are doing okay, as they were trying to make a living in a most inhospitable environment. But seeing them gave us hope. If they could make it here, then we surely could. I think of that cute little scruffy kitten often. |
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