The Most Amazing Cat Rescue

This is a true story, I'll go from the best of my memory.

Last year, I was working in our Paw Addict retail store in Newport Rhode Island on a nice sunny mid summer day. This young couple walks in, they wander around checking out the clothing displays. We exchanged some small talk and for some reason we got on the subject of cats and rescue. This guy says "Well, I have a crazy cat rescue story involving my cat"

Here's how the story begins. He's driving in New York City on the Belt Parkway, this is a six lane highway with a concrete barrier dividing it down the middle. Its a weekday in the middle of the day, its raining and traffic is fast because its not rush hour. He spots a little scared kitten frantically walking along the side of the middle concrete barrier right next to the fast lane of speeding cars. Luckily he's in the fast lane and quickly comes to a stop right before the kitten. Knowing this is a very dangerous spot, he turns on his emergency flashers hoping he doesn't cause an accident.

When he gets out of his car, he can't see the kitten anywhere. He looks under his car, nothing. Searching in front and in back of his car, all along the barrier, anywhere he can see. Surely this kitten couldn't have gotten far, and with all the cars and trucks rushing by, this thing would've gotten squashed trying the get back off the highway. Just in case the cat made it back, he waves down traffic so he can walk over to the opening off the right breakdown lane barrier to the grass. Still he sees nothing of this elusive kitten. Feeling failed on his rescue mission he makes it back over to his car, takes another look around and under his car, still nothing. At that point he gives up, puzzled to where this kitten had gone, and away he drives.

While he's driving along, he can't get this cat out of his mind. Certainly in that situation it would mean almost certain death for this beautiful creature. He had about an hour ride home back over the bridge into New Jersey. Finally he arrives back to his house and goes inside. He remembers he forgot something in his car, and goes back outside. He hears some faint high pitched "meow, meow", like the sound a little kitten would make. Where's it coming from though? Sounds like under his car, he looks under it but doesn't see anything. Again he hears "meow, meow". Sounds like its coming from the front of the car. He looks under the front of the car again and it sounds like its coming from the engine compartment. So he thinks maybe a neighborhood cat crawled up in there. So he pops the hood open and walks around and whaaaaaat the......? There crammed up in the conglomerate of hoses, wires and other engine stuff was a little grey tiger stripped kitten. Not just any kitten, but the kitten that eluded his rescue attempt on the highway.

Oooh wow, how did this happen? He grabbed this little guy to see if he was alright. Looking him over real good, he appeared to be physically ok, just a little heat singed fur, but no flesh burns or anything. But surely it must have been very traumatizing for the little guy. So apparently this kitten just jumped up inside the engine compartment when his car came to a stop on the freeway. Its amazing the cat didn't get killed from the engine even. All the heat, spinning belts and pulleys would be very dangerous for such a small creature. The little kitten clutches his new found human friend with a sense of relief.

So he decided the perfect name for his new crazily adopted pet would be "Spark Plug". He's now a full grown beautiful cat in a loving home with his rescue buddy living the life of love he deserves. This is how the guy ended the story that he told me. I got kinda choked up hearing the story because it was so awesome, and did my best to hide my emotion. I told him thank you for telling me that wonderful rescue story. The couple left without buying anything at the store, but I felt like they paid my soul with a small fortune.

After they left, I was still in a heart felt awe. I felt the urge to show my gratitude to this guy for what he did. I quickly looked around the store for something I could give him. I saw our "Peace Cat" shirt, its a tiger cat holding his paw up to a peace sign, I thought perfect. I'm good with eyeballing a persons shirt size, so I grabbed the right one and quickly threw it in a bag and went running down the sidewalk in the direction I saw them going. Luckily they were walking slowly in this congested shop district and I was able to find them. I told him "This one's on the house, that's the most amazing rescue I've ever heard".