Recently, my wife and I attended a party where the conversation got around to pets. We were discussing the merits of the loop chains for dogs and harnesses for cats and small dogs. This conversation brought back a memory of my only experience with a harness.

A few years back, I cat-sitted a fully matured Bobcat for a friend who went out of town for a few days. At the time, I had three domestics of my own that were indoor/outdoor cats. I was given a harness so I could take the Bobcat for a walk because Lenny (that's right, his name was Lenny) didn't use a litter box and of course he wasn't allowed outside without the harness. When my cats were inside, I kept them separated from Lenny by isolating him in the kitchen.

Lenny loved people but treated other cats and dogs with obvious contempt. He loved to lie on my lap and never uttered a sound except for some industrial strength purring. My job was to keep him fed, entertained and to take him for a walk using the harness when he needed to take care of business.

Talk about a walk on the wild side. Even the neighborhood dogs were terrified of this Tasmanian Devil. For his size, he pulled much harder than a dog and was hard to control. He would circle me quickly and I'd get all tangled up with the leash. His enthusiasm and quickness on these walks were amazing.

It became great entertainment for the neighborhood. People remarked, that they had never seen a cat walk a man. I would receive phone calls during the day, wanting to know when I was walking with Lenny. These walks were more fun for Lenny than they were for me. After 10 days of this, I was happy to see my friend back.

Keeping Lenny was a learning experience for me. Actually, Lenny and I were already buddies when I volunteered to keep him. I wanted to keep him at my house so I could observe how a wild cat would get along with my three female domestics. Lenny ignored them. He was only interested in me and Lily my wife. It was obvious to both of us, that Lenny was smarter and picked up on things quicker than our cats. He had the whole house and the routine figured out within two days.

Lenny had a superior IQ and he knew it. I realized later, that was probably the reason he snubbed our cats and neighborhood dogs. He was about 3 years old at the time and since then, I've always felt that the wilder the genes, the higher the natural intelligence. Lenny was a perfect gentleman while in the house, but when he stuck his nose outside, he turned into a balloon with air escaping. That's the only trouble I had with him.

When he'd lie by the door and constantly follow me with his eyes, it was his signal that it was time to walk. One other problem I had while walking, is that he insisted on doing his business in flower beds. This was not entirely his fault. We live in the hills where the front yards are small with little area for lawns, and the backyards are huge. So Lenny chose the dirt in the flower beds rather than the pavement. I was constantly apologizing to neighbors, but they reassured me that the entertainment value more than offset any messy inconvenience.

After a time my friend had to take Lenny to his uncle's home in the foothills of the Sierras in California because his job required that he move to Boston. I never saw Lenny again.

Lenny lived the remainder of his 12 years happily, not more than 10 miles from where he was found as a kitten next to his dead mother that had been shot.

Lenny was easily the smartest animal I've been around and I'll never forget him.

Copyright © Bill Franks
January 27, 2002