To the editor;
My friend John Shablerwas stepping into his car to pick up a few things at Barriere AG Foods last week when his young cat decided to join him. Although it was not something John normally allowedTommyto do, he let him come along this time since it was a very short trip and little Tommy loved to be with his owner. Unfortunately, the result of giving in to the cat’s wish turned out to be heartbreaking.
John had left the car running while parked to keep the air conditioningon and forgot to engage the Child Safetybutton that would have prevented Tommy from pushing the electric window down. Ever curious, Tommy touched the button, the window opened and the cat jumped out and started looking for his owner.
When John saw what had happened he called me and we went out searchingfor the escapee. We had no luck, so we went home and I did all the search notifications and practices I could think of at the time.
John received a call from a young woman later. Indeed, they had found Tommy,but tearfully she reported that he had been hit by a car and killed. Tommy was wearing a collar that showed his identity and his phone number, allowing the young woman to make fast contact with the owner.
John found out that the four women who found Tommy were part of the North Thompson Fall Fair Ambassador Program and were on their way to an Ambassador function when they saw the young cat lying on the road obviously in bad shape. Nothing else was important at that moment to them than to stop and hopefully be able to help.
It was Tommy, as they found out from the information on his collar. The cat was dead, and the girls were extremely distressed, but that did not stop them from doing everything that could be done. They took a towel and wrapped the still warm body of little Tommy into it and waited for John to come.
John spoke to me later when we buried his little friend about his thoughts of the sad and disturbing incident, saying, “Those young women are true Ambassadors for theirtown, they were not required to stop and become involved with such a distressing accident, when not even the perpetrator had stopped to see what he had done and simply drove on. The young women showed such amazing kindness and caring which is rare in today’ssociety, Barriere can proud to have them as citizens of our town.”
Elli Kohnert Barriere, B.C.