Is that a kitten in your sweatshirt, or are you just happy to see me?

When I first started working at my school, it was mandatory to have a class pet. This carried over from the grammar school which feeds us, and it was not uncommon to have a kid walk up holding a snake while he talked to you.

Thankfully, this practice has died out.

Anyway, in my second year of teaching, one of my students, who was then a freshman (now a senior), walked into my room. "Ms. M, I have something to show you, but you have to promise not to freak out."

This is always a fun way to begin a conversation. I gave the standard, "Feel free to tell me, but if someone is being hurt in some way, or if it is illegal, I do have to report it," line.

She said neither, and pulled out what I thought was a guinea pig from the kangaroo pocket of her school sweatshirt. Then I looked closer and saw it was a kitten whose little eyes hadn't even opened yet. And then she pulled out another.

She and a friend found a litter with no mother by it. Presumably, the mother was feeding or using the outdoor facilities. So what did they do? Snuck them into school in their sweatshirt pockets.

I freaked, understandably, and asked what her plans were for the kitten. She said she wanted to keep one, and her friend was going to keep the other. They knew the kittens were too young to survive on their own, so they were just going to smuggle them into school each day. She was going to give her milk carton to the kittens at lunch in the bathroom and rub their rear ends with toilet paper to make them use the rest room because "the mother licks them on the butt to make them go." I blurted out something about cats being lactose intolerant, and that I'd never heard of the tp thing, and ohmygodyoubetternotgetcaught!!!

The more I thought about it, the more concerned I was for these kittens, who never should have left their mother. I got some animal-loving teachers, including one who used to foster animals, and we confiscated the kittens. We took a cardboard box, lined it with the sheets I stored in my cabinet to cover my bookcases and computers over the summer, and got the heat lamp from the iguana that was in the classroom across from mine. My friend, K, took the kittens home, and she and her sister hand-fed them every few hours. Her sister ended up adopting the cats, because the girls' mothers said they couldn't keep the kittens, and now these poor motherless babies would have no way to survive. Both kittens matured into lovely cats. One lives with the sister, while the other is an outdoor (fixed) cat.

The student left for sophomore and junior years, and returned for her senior year. When I saw her at book day, I said, "You know...we don't have kangaroo pocket sweatshirts any more. So, you're not going to be able to smuggle kittens in here any more!!" She cracked up, and now it's our joke...."And while you're at it, don't smuggle any kittens in here!"