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"Three little kit-tens, three little kit-tens, one, two, three, one, two, three. They all have the ringworm, we are trying to cure them, so they won't die, they won't die."
The kittens were sitting in line on the back of Honey's recliner, where they had climbed to investigate their foster father's odd singing behavior. I touched each of them, one, two, three, in time to the tune of "Frere Jacques." (In English: "Are you sleeping, Brother John?")
The kittens sat still through several repetitions, mesmerized by the song and rhythmic touching, as if they sensed I was doing something important, and I was: I was singing my hope that these sweet little creatures would not have to be euthanized.
"If they can't be cured, the pound will probably put them down," Honey had told me 10 days ago when, noticing little patches of lost fur on ears, toes and elsewhere, she first diagnosed the probable ringworm infection.
I was shocked. I picked up gentle little Cammie and gazed sadly into her trusting eyes. My own eyes were getting misty. I told Honey that the kitten was saying to me, 'You won't let them kill me, will you, Daddy?'"
My retired veterinarian wife assured me that was, in fact, a very possible outcome. A ringworm outbreak is a nightmare scenario for an animal shelter. But we can't keep them; we are full-up on cats.
It was a month and a half ago that we undertook the responsibility of fostering a litter of five kittens that someone had dropped off at the animal shelter. Soon they were zooming around the house and cuddling on our laps. The initial shock and dismay of our four resident adult cats eventually subsided, the mild hisses and growls were overcome by curiosity, and there were even genuine efforts to play from both sides.
When the two males of the litter grew to the magical size of two pounds, they were returned to the shelter and soon were adopted. The three females took another two weeks to reach that goal, which they did just as my wife spotted the ringworm infection. Examination at the shelter with a special ultraviolet lamp confirmed it. Honey brought them home and initiated treatment.
The poor little things hardly complained or struggled as Honey bathed them one at a time in the kitchen sink and handed each one to me to wrap and dry in a towel. They submitted meekly as she scrubbed and medicated the infected spots. They swallowed with a grimace and head-shake the liquid medicine she squirted down their throats. Each one had to wear a miniature plastic Elizabethan collar, better known as a "cone of shame," on their heads until the medication dried so they couldn't lick it off. We laughed at their efforts to rid themselves of the cones, consisting mainly of walking backwards and digging with their paws.
Ringworm is a fungal disease spread by spores through close contact, as kittens of course engage in continuously, playing and sleeping with their litter mates. The name comes from the often circular pattern of hair loss as an infected spot spreads. To kill the spores Honey laundered the blankets and washed the other surfaces and materials the kittens contacted. Dogs, people and other creatures can catch ringworm, but cats are especially prone to it.
As to my "Three Little Kit-tens" song, it is completely appropriate that I would adapt an old French/English children's ditty to announce the potentiality of impending death to its possible victims. Most nursery rhymes had dark origins. "Jack and Jill" was a complaint about liquor taxes. "London Bridge" may have referenced a Viking attack on London. "Ring Around the Rosie" is about the Black Plague. "Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary" recalls the executions of hundreds of Protestants by England's "Bloody Queen Mary," a Catholic. Her "silver bells and cockleshells" were torture devices. The "Three Blind Mice" were Protestant bishops who plotted to overthrow Mary and were burned at the stake for it.
Effecting a cure for ringworm requires the iron will to see the thing through, which my wife has in abundance. I am confident that she will cure the kittens and they will find happy homes.
And any suggestion that the above historical references to Queen Mary in any way represent a comparison to my wife is a spurious and offensive conclusion springing from your febrile imagination. I accept your apology on her behalf.