Tig-reffic 2015

     (Real talk...) They are dear to you? Or they are dear?

     (From enchantment of meeting for the first time tiger cubs in a small time clinic to excitement of having them as patients...)

     (Seriously, as I sworn to be a veterinarian as profession...)

     I dunno how to start the story but it all happened when a client decided to have his exotic pets have their onychectomy in the clinic. Yes, a simple procedure one would comment on. A minor surgery for that matter.

     I wanted to break down before the first vet where we planned to have a necropsy. A blood profiling was suggested. I felt an invisible tap on my shoulder to keep pushing on what was right. So the cadaver was put on blood extraction but it was too late for the blood to be run because of hemolysis.

     T'was so hard one would imagine... The surgery done, one with a licensed vet and the other not. Yes, there was a consent stating we will not be held liable anything beyond control. We dunno if read well by the representative or was just signed for the sake of doing it. Explaining to the owner after the disastrous op was that epic epistaxis. And yes, we were cornered, pinned and pecked.

     Put a scene of a starting clinic stuffed at minimum so the client saw and even affirmed it after the op. The ridicule washed us to the thinnest of our confidence and all that was left was shock and submission.

     Next to be shot, like a motion picture in the making, was an animal doctor brought in a strange place of big barrels far from the usual street noise to live with a declawed tiger cub and a Yorkie. To sleep with a tiger? I tried to have a photo taken together with a tamed tiger and I was laxed posing so I had the same laxity only to be (play)bitten. Ouch-y cry... Six nights and five days of a trio of a human, a canine and a feline. Oh 2015. I would downplay, a sure thing, all these happenstances by 2016.

 

                                               Pushing the facial muscles to smile...

     (Doing drama...)

S                    o
   t        o           g        
     r         f            r                        b
       i                      e         a             l
         p                                n             a
           e                                d             c
             s                                               k.
                       

             
                S   S   I                  N
            A                V        A        D
             M              E                        R    O
  O   U                                        T              N
F        R                                      S             G

                             A         W
                    P                          S
                             almost
                      twice or thrice
       that of an adult Labrador Retriever.

                            E            W
                    D                             Y
                  ST                             ES.
                              A       R

                    
                              SHARP   

               N                                        G
           I       E              H               N
      N              S              E         I
   A                                    L    O
C                                           L
     when the warm temperature sets in.

                     Flaring up nostrils
                                                               y
                                                 l
          and                     h
                          g
                  i
          h
              s     e     n     s     i      n      g
  w
           h
                    i
                               s
                                         k
                                                  e
                                                          r
                                                                 s          
 moving
         with the panting
  and roaring.

Spiky tongue grooming its

W              G               L           N          t a. i l.
         I               G             I             G

            A four-month-old large cat gracefully 
            roaming  
                    in an
                         executive office.

     And he was my housemate, playmate and patient for days. So adorable being that would beg your hands for a petting on the head and belly rub and simply your presence. Without a sight of another moving creature would he let out whimpering and pawing by the door.

     Parting from him, away from his familiar smell and soft moans when caressed against his furry back, was a bit tear-jerking. And tomorrow's morning of a tiger sleeping like a log under a table of his milk canister, feeding bottle, pills of supplements to wake up to a meal of pure delight would be missed.

     I'd be counting years... But in the know in a span of a few months, hoping there would be a reason to see him, I could be lulled by his bulk approaching me. He wouldn't be in his high-pitched baby cries but in a full roar. He would be lodged in his steel barriers...