SUSAN LOESCH

So what does a library cat do when he isn’t working with the kids, helping them select books or  work on the computer? He keeps busy with many other things!

Over the past week or so Shadow has dressed for Easter, acquired additional computer skills, worked with the printer and…gotten married!

Barney had the opportunity to become a style icon, and he turned it down.

Shadow continues to love to sit, sleep or stand on my keyboard — or knock it off the desk entirely if he doesn’t have enough wiggle room. Sitting on the keyboard this week, he managed to turn off the monitor. Confused as to where his picture had gone, he looked up at us as if to ask, “What in the world happened? You are going to fix it, of course.”

And we did.

He found the printer and wasn’t sure paper was supposed to come out, piece-by-piece as it was doing, so he monitored the printer for a while. I am just glad he hasn’t learned to print on his own.

And I wish he didn’t feel the need to rearrange all the figurines and pictures sitting on my printer!

Barney modeled a handsome orange and white striped t-shirt. It was stylishly trimmed in a masculine blue and said “Tuff Guy,” which is a perfect description of Barn.

He looked so fine, but he let us know in no uncertain terms that he didn’t approve. After rolling around in it, he stood in front of Mary and Lea and “Rahrr’d” a demand that it come off.

They tried to tell him what a handsome dude he was but to no avail.

Once freed of the offensive T-shirt, Barn went to work patrolling the library while secondary kids were here. He’s become my go-to guy for working with older kids.

Meanwhile Shadow came to school the Friday before Easter wearing a wonderful Easter bandana from Ms. Lanita. It was yellow and white and was adorned with a yellow chick. He did look fine and was much admired.

Being admired is, of course, a major job responsibility for a library cat, and both Shadow and Barney take that part of their job very seriously.

He caught up with a group of my juniors and seniors and posed with them for a picture. Of the 5 students, I’ve had three since they were tiny. They don’t remember the library without a library cat!

Oh, and about getting married … Bailey came to the library with her class and was kissing Shadow. “Are you guys getting married?” asked one of her classmates.

“Yes, we are,” said Bailey. “Shadow is my husband.”

The class went on to check out books and read for the period. When they lined up to leave, as she went out the door, Bailey called out, “Bye, Shadow. Bye, my husband!”

And you thought being a library cat involved just books and reading!

SUSAN LOESCH

As our fall semester gets underway I thought it might be fun to tell you how our Library Cat Program got its start. To do that you have to meet Piper, a bobtail orange tabby who has just had his 10th birthday.

Piper came into my life in September, 2000, when he was just 5 weeks old. He had been
found in a drainpipe at a big grocery store; someone heard him crying. He was rescued by Care for Animals, and they asked me to foster him.

Oh, my goodness, did I fall in love with him! The first thing this little ball of fluff did was cuddle up under my chin and nurse on my neck. To this day he still does that, especially when he is nervous.

He began coming to school with me and seemed to enjoy it.

We began to connect our Library Cat Program with the new Accelerated Reader program. Our first “prize books” were called Piper‟s Picks.

Everyone loved to feed Piper chicken, his favorite food, especially baby food chicken.

He enjoyed his first Halloween with the students and at Christmas had his picture taken with Santa for the first time.

He had his favorite kids, most of whom have now graduated from high school. One of
his favorites was Harry, who earned the very first AR reading poster. He posed with
Piper for a sign that said, “Piper and Harry say, ‘Reading is Happy!’ ”

He also accompanied Jasmine to the Art Room where they posed as living models for a drawing class.

In the late spring of 2001, Big Footsie came into our lives, and it was obvious that he had all the traits of a great library cat. In the fall of 2001, both Footsie and Piper came to school, and Piper showed Footsie the ropes. He got the hang of eating treats — and plants
— really fast.

Piper and Footsie led our elementary kids to a fun “Rally Round the Sign” when our
school sign said “Home of Piper and Big Footsie, Only Library Cats In Arkansas.” We all
hiked down to the sign and took lots of pictures.

Not long into the year we had a huge first birthday party for Piper in the library. He had such a good time, but already Footsie was showing signs of taking over. … He opened a
huge bag of cat food which had been a gift to Piper and began to eat it!

As time went by, Piper let us know that he was more of a homebody than a working cat.

The job he really wanted was greeting me when I got home from school and washing my face as he purred a welcome.

Footsie, on the other hand, was more career-oriented, so he moved into the Head Library Cat position, and Piper became our Head Library Cat Emeritus.

Our kids still know Piper and ask for him to visit, so he comes a few times a year. He is always there for our Library Cat Christmas, a whole school party which all the library cat
staff attends.

Piper usually spends that day curled up in my office bathroom sink! He receives visitors there, and everyone knows where to go to see him.

At the end of the party day, most of the library cats are tired and sleepy, but not Piper. He has rested all day and is ready to play when he gets home!

Now Piper spends his days snoozing, hanging out with his buddies and greeting me every
afternoon with heartwarming enthusiasm. He continues to be my “soul-mate kitty.”

Piper wasn’t our Head Library Cat for very long, but he laid the foundation for the whole program. And what a great job he did!

SUSAN LOESCH
CATS IN THE STACKS

High school graduation, alumni gathering, and Hexie’s last work day, all on the same day!

Hexie is on duty one last time for the year. As she was roaming the library first period, all decked out in her pink bandana, she was doing what has become her own “Hexie thing.”

She goes from student to student rubbing against their legs to greet them. As one student said this morning, “She reminds me of my dog, she always comes and rubs against me!”

Another asked if she would be coming back next year. She will, and he was glad. It hasn’t taken long for everyone to fall in love with this petite girl with the one bright green eye.

“She is just the right cat for here, isn’t she,” commented a teacher.

Only a couple of my 6th graders were here, and they wanted to take a last picture with Hexie.

Taylor was proudly wearing his newly-won award, the Principal’s Award. He said something to make me laugh, and I laughed out loud. I had told his class how, in secondary, library isn’t as fun any more. No more hanging on the beanbags, watching video and having a good loud time while we learn.

“I know I can’t make you laugh in here next year,” he said, taking my warning to heart. I assured him that he can; I will just laugh quietly!

Later in the morning, alumni drifted in. Do you want to know how to feel old, really old? Just visit with a couple of former students, one who has been gone for 15 years and the other for 26!

It couldn’t possibly have been that long, could it? A few weeks ago a more recent graduate came by for a visit. She has graduated from college and just gotten married and is moving out of state. “You aren’t old, Ms. Loesch,”  she said.” Boy, I wish!!

On this graduation day, there is a little less structure than most days. Awards assemblies in the morning, a school-wide lunch, and then high school graduation.

I sat during part of the ceremony with tears in my eyes. It wasn’t because of the graduation itself, or the kids leaving, but during the keynote speech.

As Rep. Kathy Webb spoke to the kids, she talked about the many people who they have to thank for lessons learned. She mentioned family and teachers and friends…and Big Footsie, who many have known since elementary days, and who, she said, taught them about life and all creatures and love and loss. He truly did that, as did Alex. And as our new library cats will do for seniors still to come.

SUSAN LOESCH

CATS IN THE STACKS

We are such an uptown library! Not only do we have resident artist Monsieur Shadeaux on the staff, now we also have Monsieur Bar-nay, artiste extraordinaire.

Barney got his chance to create Shadow Art on Monday; I guess we would call it Barney Art, though!

With a little help from his friends, he paw-painted a picture using food colors, orange, purple, pink and green, with which Mary helped him create what we think will be his specialty – starbursts.

Barney wasn’t as into art as Shadow was, but he was really good-natured about it.

All the work made him hungry, and he ate treats from the hand of Zee, our exchange student from Turkey.

“My mother would never believe this,” she told me. I am printing out pictures of Zee with the library cats so she can show her family that she really has been petting cats for the first time in her life.

Barney is a little more sedate than the other library cats; I chalk that up to his age and wisdom. He is, after all, 4 years old.

So a supervisory job suits him perfectly. He kept an eye on Chris as he helped me check in the influx of library books being returned.

“I guess it is a good thing it is Barney here today,” I said to a student.

“Yeah, if it had been Shadow or Big Footsie, books would have been all over the place,” she said with a smile.

Later in the afternoon, Barney attended a party for one of our teachers who is leaving this year.

As we were gathered in the teachers’ lounge, one of the staff members asked if Barney would eat cake. I said I thought he might lick the icing.

“Hey, everybody, if you want your cake don’t get close to Barney,” someone called.

Given the chance at the icing on Mr. Huntsman’s cake he proved us wrong. He wasn’t the least bit interested in it.

This was a fun day on the job for Barney, and he nearly missed it.

When I was ready to go to work and saw him he just KNEW what was up. He jumped on a bookcase and tried to hide behind the books.

I wonder if he is glad I caught him before he disappeared!

SUSAN LOESCH
CATS IN THE STACKS

What a busy few days we have had, with the final Acelerated Reader rally coming up and students reading to reach their goals so that they can go on their reward field trips. I have been busy taking the last few reading poster pictures and creating the posters.

Friday, Hexie was here for her photo shoot. She posed gracefully every time she was asked and then busied herself offering to be held and checking on the students as they worked.

“I love her feet, one student said. She has the skinniest feet of all the library cats.”

She is the smallest and lightest cat we’ve had for a long time.

This was only her second visit, but you’d think she’d been coming for years she was so relaxed.

Today, Shadow is here. More students need their poster pictures taken, and they have asked for Shadow to pose with them.

Hexie may be the smallest kitty we’ve had in some time, but Shadow has got to be the busiest!

He reminds me of a young Footsie, into everything, on everything (including my computer keyboard), knocking things off the counter right and left!

“Good job, Shadow,” the kids tell him. They are loving having another cat who knocks things over like Footsie did.

Shadow started the day visiting with Lea.

“He should be the main library cat,” she said. “He is just perfect.”

He enjoyed her petting and thought her black fingernail polish was cool. It does, after all, match his shiny coat.

Mr. G. came in to say hi to Shadow and check out his new very masculine zebra-patterned collar. “That collar gives you a whole new persona, Dude,” he told Shadow.

Several of today’s pictures were taken with the third graders.

After approving of his photo, one of the boys gave Shadow’s claws a closer inspection.

“Why are they so sharp?” he asked. “And why do they stick out?” “Do you have some of those special scissors to cut them?”

I know it is supposed to be “Books Before Cats” around here, but it was just such a great time to show how to clip a cat’s claws and explain how claws work. Shadow was the perfect gentlemen both while his claws were inspected and while they were clipped.

That, however, was the last time that period that he was still, and our “Books Before Cats” rule went out the window!

The kids started playing with him with string and cat toys. Shadow chased the string and the kids chased him. The kids were laughing and talking all at once, and Shadow just played on.

We all had a good time having “Cats Before Books” for a day! We are nothing around here if not flexible.

SUSAN LOESCH
CATS IN THE STACKS

OK, Library Cat Staff. We need to have a meeting!

The staff members have been really bad about disappearing into thin air about the time I am ready to stash one of them in a carrier and head to work. Last week’s work schedule fell totally apart, and the cat on duty was whoever wasn’t hidden well enough.

This is quite a change from when I’d call, “Let’s go to school, Big Footsie,” and he would come running and dive-bomb into the carrier. Alex sometimes made me look for him, but he was usually somewhere in plain sight. My current staff needs to improve!

Tank made it last week on kindergarten story-hour day.

He sat in my lap for most of the story but left before it was over.

I think Barney will get most of the story-hour duties, but Tank is an awesome treat-eater! He gets a little impatient as small hands struggle to open the treats and he has to wait.

Barney has worked really hard lately. He likes walking and sitting on Braille and giving head-butts.

He was on duty when his friends Conall and Caitlin came to visit our school for the first time. They fed him treats and catnip before they looked at books.

Caitlin kept saying “Look at his tail; it is standing up!”

This morning Barney had a cool experience. He went to speech class to serve as a prop for a speech. As Barney sat calmly in his bed, the class was shown how to brush a cat and told why and when cats shed. It’s all in a day’s work for the Barn.

Shadow was just as calm wearing his Cinco de Mayo finery, which my fourth graders brought.

Later in the week, my fifth and sixth graders came in. Shadow was, of course, wearing his infamous blue collar with – yes, the flowers.

“Awww, look at his cute collar,” said Makayla. “It even has flowers on it.”

I started to smile and feel somewhat vindicated in my choice of collars, but that didn’t last. As we were watching a video, Mary was standing close by. Into the room wandered Shadow, comfortably weaving between students and under chairs.

“Hmmm,” I heard Mary say. “Real manly collar you have there, Shadow, flowers and diamonds, too.”

OK; it will be off to PetSmart just as soon as I can. Object: Purchase manly collar for Shadow.

SUSAN LOESCH

CATS IN THE STACKS

End of Course exams and the Jr./Sr. Prom…what a week here! The result was lots of extra kids in the library, lots of attention for the library cats, and me finding my new best friends…the Rugrats!

Barney was here on prom day. The seniors were not really interested in their teachers’ assignments, and who can blame them? Barney got lots of petting from kiddos who had been in elementary school when Footsie first arrived on the scene and had grown up with him.

Mary put Footsie’s pink bandana on Barney. “Thank you for being a real man and wearing pink, she told him! None of the guys here will wear pink.”

I finally dug out some Rugrats videos which had just been donated, had the seniors pull beanbag chairs into the video room and watch.

Ah, peace reigned, at last, and the older kids had a ball doing “little kid stuff!”

On Friday I brought our final applicant for a Library Cat position, Shadow. More than one person remarked that catching a quick glimpse of him, for a second it seemed that Big Footsie was back.

Shadow is about a year old, found as a stray kitten. Feline Rescue and Rehome helped his rescuers take care of him, supplying food, litter and medical care. When they moved where they could not have cats, Shadow became a FuRR kitty.

I had older kids first period, quiet and tired from the prom. We sat at a table with Shadow and he acted as if he’d been here for years, being held, sitting in laps, posing for pictures, and just basically lapping up the attention.

We took his picture smelling Mary’s prom roses.

Then came my younger students!

“He looks like a Shadow.” “He really looks like Big Footsie only more so!” “We need to call him Big Footsie Two, or Big Footsie Returns.” ”He has to be Big Footsie the Second, and Barney is Alex the Second.”

From my fifth grader, Brianna: “He interacts with everyone. He’s perfect. He’s gonna be a camera star!”

Brianna has been in the library a lot this week observing the library cats and how they interact with everyone, information for the class newspaper article she was writing on the cats. She is moving out of state after today, and her whole class was full of energy when they came for Library Skills. So, once again, out came the beanbags and the Rugrats.

“I had never seen the Rugrats before yesterday,” I told them.

“Ms, Loesch, you haven’t SEEN them? You’re weird! But we love you anyway,” said Brianna.

The video held everyone’s interest, and the group was quiet. From now on I think the Rugrats and I are gonna be really tight!

SUSAN LOESCH

CATS IN THE STACKS

It is Lady’s Day here in the library! Library Cat version, that is. Sweet little Hexie is auditioning for a spot on the Library Cat Staff, and by the time she had been here two hours she had nailed it.

It is a good thing I hadn’t planned to bring Barney today. Seems Mr. B. is going to be one to set his own work schedule. Again this morning he was nowhere to be found, choosing to rest, no doubt, after his busy day at work yesterday.

Barney excited everyone by eating treats out of Brianna’s hand. 

This is the first time he has done that, previously preferring to pick them up off the counter.

Eating treats offered by hand earns major Head Library Cat points!

He also let Patrick videotape him, to be included in a You-Tube video about our school. He must have felt like a real celebrity.

There was a crowd watching Brianna take pictures of Patrick filming him!  Such is the life of a star.

To cap the day off he joined our kindergarten class for their story hour.

I put his bed in my lap and read  Three Stories You Can Read to Your Cat, by Sara Swann.

My new definition of grace under fire is a cat who can stay calm in the midst of a storm of  eight little hands touching whiskers, feeling ears, holding tail and petting, all while listening to a story!

We made it through two of the three stories before they had to leave and will save the third for another story hour.

“We want Barney to be here all the time,” someone suggested. From the way he sat there, it seems like he might enjoy that.

This morning Hexie first met some of my older students.  I told them about her eyes.

Hexie has only one eye; her other one had to be removed when she was little and sometimes the place where the eye was gives her problems.

“Awww,” said one of my seniors. She is just like us.”

Her remaining eye is the most beautiful emerald green.

“The problems she has are not serious,” I told them, “They are just…”  I paused, looking for the word.

“Annoying,” said one of the kids. “I understand.”  That is exactly it, and they really do understand.

Hexie made herself at home, wandering the library, jumping up on tables, head-butting new friends.

“You will like it here,” one told her when they met.

She ate some treats, met lots of kids and teachers, and, finally, my fourth graders.

As she passed out head-butts, one of them told her, “You are a nice cat. We are going to be really good friends.”

So now we are close to having a full staff.  A Head Library Cat, Barney, a First Assistant to the Head  Library Cat, Tank, and an Assistant Library Cat, Hexie.

I think we will meet one more candidate, Shadow, a kitty as black as Footsie and as round as Barney and Tank.

He may join the staff, but the other three have definitely been hired!

SUSAN LOESCH
CATS IN THE STACKS

“C’mon, Barney. Let’s go to school.”

Silence.

Mr. Barney was nowhere to be found this morning. He must have decided that after his weekend appearances at the Feline Rescue and Rehome fundraiser he deserves a day off!

Tank was ready to fill in for him. He got to meet one of my returning sixth graders for the first time.

“Wow, he’s big,” was her reaction.

He isn’t as outgoing as Barney yet, but boy, can he pass out the best head-butts. He also had a visit with Makayla. She gave him hugs and kisses.

“I just love you, Tank,” she said. “I love his patterns. They look like the cats you see out in the wild.”

As she hurried out the door when the bell rang, Tank walked along the counter following her and he knocked a book off.

“You should tell him ‘good job’ for knocking things off just like we said to Big Footsie. Bye, Tank. I love you.”

Barney was a huge attraction Friday and Saturday at the sale. The weather meant that we quickly covered everything with plastic and headed for cover several times, and Barney took it in stride. Nothing much seems to ruffle him.

“Hi, Barney. I’m so glad to meet you.” We heard this from lots of people who are regular readers of Cats in the Stacks. Many told me how sorry they are about Alex.

Barney seemed to love meeting everyone and he posed with one of his followers, Ms. Danya.

He met kids; he met adults; he nearly met a dog or two! He wore his Harley-Davidson bandana and even his Harley cap, all with good humor.

As long as he was in someone’s lap or arms he seemed as comfortable as Alex has always been at events.

He even tolerated posing with a couple of us in crazy wigs. I wonder if he was thinking to himself, “Mommm. You are SO embarrassing me!”

“So, is Barney the new Library Cat?” several people asked me.

He certainly is one of them, and he is showing that he has the qualities a Head Library Cat needs.

He could do some work, though, on his Fancy Feast-eating and treat-eating skills!

He and Tank both have a way to go before they are up to Alex’s speed of eating three cans of Fancy Feast  each day.

SUSAN LOESCH
CATS IN THE STACKS

Yeah, it is Friday! The kids and teachers are glad because testing is over, and the library cats are glad because next week the elementary students will be back in the library. They have been missed, but there have been extra secondary kids hanging out here and we’ve enjoyed that.

Both Tank and Barney have gotten lots of attention.

“Ms. Loesch, come HERE!” called Mary. She and Tank were in my office and she had a handful of treats. “Tank won’t eat treats. He can’t be a library cat unless he eats treats.” Not to worry. He does like treats; he just wants to pick them up himself rather than having them offered in a hand.

Barney is less of a treat-eater than Tank; he has to work on that. Our speech teacher brings her youngest students in armed with treats and they expect them to be eaten by a library cat!

Of course there are my fourth graders who recently sampled the treats themselves … but that just wouldn’t be the same.

Both Tank and Barney have modeled the Harley-Davidson cap. Their vote seems to be unanimous; it gets a big paws down.

The cap has gotten the kids talking about next Halloween. With the Harley cap and bandana, all we need to do is find a leather jacket and we will have a biker-cat costume.

Trinity, my junior, who has been my student since kindergarten, was petting Tank. “It is just not the same, is it, Ms. Loesch? When Big Footsie died we already had Alex. He was already a library cat, and we loved him. This time we don’t have anybody.”

She is right. And from now on we won’t go without at least one assistant library cat as well as our “head” cat. It seems that for now Barney will have the “head” job with Tank as his assistant. Barney has gotten the hang of the job a little quicker.

He will roam the library looking for people to hang out with, and he stays on the front desk most of the time … except when he is following someone around. Mary says that he likes to play “follow the leader.” He has also mastered the “sleeping on the desk between the keyboard and monitor” job.

This week he gotten to spend a lot of time with Zee, our Turkish exchange student. We took pictures of them for Zee to have when she goes home.

As she stood with her hand on Barney’s side, her interest in becoming a doctor kicked in.

“He is breathing so fast. Do cats breathe faster than people? What is his normal temperature? How do you know if he is sick? If I ever get a cat, now I will know more about how to take care of it.”

These words make me smile, coming from my student who earlier in the year had never petted a cat and was afraid of them. Alex made her love him, and now Barney and Tank are picking up where he left off.

We still have a couple of candidates for library cat who will be auditioning, but it looks like both Team Barney and Team Tank will be happy; both the guys are on the library cat staff for sure!