This is the 2nd baby rabbit that Sophie-the-13-year-old-cat has brought in to us. Unfortunately, the 1st one didn’t survive the experience 🙁 . (We won’t go in to the gruesome way it ended up, and it wasn’t really the cat’s fault…)

Usually when Sophie brings me ‘gifts,’ if I can get to her immediately, and praise her for being a mighty huntress, she lets go the prey & loses interest. At which point I release the shaken bird/ rabbit/ mouse back in to the yard.

This time? Hector the cat was downstairs, as were both dogs. The living room was a veritable domestic zoo: dogs barking, rabbit shrieking (Have you ever heard them cry? They sound like babies!), the two cats scrabbling to catch the rabbit. Finally I got the dogs outside, the cats settled, and pulled out the sofa to try to catch baby rabbit. Which promptly FLEW into the study, between my two (heavy) filing cabinets. That was it; I had nooo idea what to do next.

Long, worried story short: eventually my elder son — home for a few days — was able to catch it and release it outside. Even though we all know that Sophie may well catch it again. She caught the same mouse twice in two days; the first time it bit me, but the 2nd it ran nicely into the cup I held for it.

You do the right thing even when you know it may, ultimately, make little difference. It’s the hardest lesson I re-learn daily. Easy w/ a cute baby rabbit. Much more difficult when I’m trying to remember to be polite to someone who believes the president should die, or that all education should be privatised. Next time this happens? I’m going to try to remember the bunny, held gently in my son’s hands, awaiting at least one more night of life. Sometimes, you just have to hope for the best.