From the Vault: Archie’s Incident
Over the last week I have shared a favorite memory with almost all of the pack. Tonight is one so big, it needs no title other than Archie’s name attached to the word “Incident.”
One evening my husband and I had a friend over for dinner. After dinner, my friend and I went for a walk with IO and Jack. Archie was a wee thing, a tiny orange furball and maybe 10 weeks old at best. When we came back, I saw my husband standing on the front porch holding little Archie up to the sky. That’s odd, I thought. He seemed relieved to see me and quickly explained that he had “broken” the cat and now Archie was making a funny noise. “What?!”, I exclaimed. And this is what he told me happened:
My husband was sitting in the recliner reading the paper, when Archie suddenly went crazy. He began making strange growling sounds, “Raow raow ra-raow!” at the top of the spiral staircase. He continued growling, raced down the stairs, and smacked headfirst into the wall opposite the stairs. Before my husband could process this spectacle, Archie continued the rampage and galloped across the living room towards my husband. He tussled with the cord to the lamp, knocked it over, simultaneously breaking the light bulb and causing the room to go dark; all before yet again hurtling headfirst, this time into the floor-to-ceiling window behind the aforementioned recliner. Upon hearing the thump, my husband immediately sat up to see if he was okay, released the footrest on the recliner, closed it and promptly heard that horrifyingly unmistakable sound that every cat owner dreads hearing. You know, the same bloodcurdling sound that occurs upon accidentally stepping on a cat… Yeah, that sound, times about a thousand. Archie had apparently decided to take cover in the chair, and my husband, in trying to make sure he was OK, had unwittingly smooshed him in it. Finally, my husband rescued Archie. By this time he was wheezing so my husband brought him outside, thinking the fresh air might help…
…And this is when we walked up. I put my ear to Archie’s chest and listened to the wheezing sound. Terrified that he had somehow punctured a lung I looked at the clock and gave myself a maximum of 10 minutes to decide if emergency vet care was necessary—it was a Sunday night, because why wouldn’t it be? Within a few minutes his breathing had returned to normal. He seemed to have simply knocked the wind out of himself. We laugh about it now, but man, did he ever frighten us that night.