Milo has entered The Age of Teeth.
Anyone who has raised a kitten knows that there is a time when everything – a challenge, a caress, the coffee table – is approached with tiny fangs bared. The fur of Dash’s tail probably hides a hundred battle scars by now, souvenirs of a tiny tiger flinging himself bodily at his three times larger foe and letting loose the baby teeth of war. Taming The Bite is a key part of kitten raising in my book – little teeth are eventually shed in favor of big teeth, and as much as I don’t want to get bitten by little teeth, I want to get mauled by big teeth even less.
Luckily, Milo is far from the most vociferous of the kittens I have raised (that honor went to Sebastian, my only other orange kitty – in all other respects my gold standard cat, but in the matter of Little Teeth – well, he used to get “time out,” papoosed for long minutes in a blanket or towel until he calmed down sufficiently to re-enter society without perforating it). However, the blissful repose of stroking a tiny, warm, purring body is often broken by the sting of tiny needles on fingers or arm.
We shall persevere, though – Milo is a wonderful addition to our household (no matter what the folks who think we’re daft to have three cats and a dog may say). And Dash really seems fond of him, even when he’s zooming sideways around the living room, only stopping long enough to fling himself bodily at the grey big brother.
