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| Marcel Strigberger |
I’m talking about Bugra and Ezgi, husband and wife, who are divorcing. Bugra has two cats; he is transferring custody to Ezgi and agreeing to pay support for the felines in the amount of 10,000 lira or about 330 loonies a month. Noble gesture. No doubt he believes he did a far better thing than he had ever done before.
The problem I foresee is that this gesture may set a precedent for courts everywhere. It may not be long before we see the introduction of amendments to the Divorce Act in Canada that provide for determination of cat support upon dissolution of a relationship. Alongside the child support guidelines, it would not surprise me to see something called “Tabby Tables”:
- One cat: five per cent of your net income;
- Two cats: Nine per cent of your net income;
- Three cats: 15 per cent of your net income, plus you have to take the cats biannually to PetSmart to choose some toys. You asked for it.
Caveat kitty owners.
Another issue may be the duration of the cat support. Hopefully, for Bugra’s sake, the cats will only have one life. Just a fleeting thought.
Then we have a couple in India who separated after about a one-year marriage as the husband’s dog and the wife’s cat did not get along. Each complained that the other’s pet was violent towards the other and insisted the other get rid of their respective animal.
The parties tried to resolve the impasse via family intervention and family counselling. There were even attempts at mediation, which failed.
I know why the mediation failed. The key parties should have been present, namely Fido and Felix. Presence of the decision-makers is crucial for a successful mediation resolution. To make everyone comfortable, a fine lunch could have been provided. A couple of bowls of milk and kibble would have resolved the mediation with the key players shaking paws. Alas, missed opportunity.
I’m actually afraid of cats. When I was a kid in Montreal, I was minding my business playing street hockey when a neighbouring black cat known as Gaston came out of nowhere and lunged at me, drawing blood from my shin. I could have lived with this traumatic event with my mother applying some iodine and a band-aid, but my Uncle Abe urged my dad to see a lawyer, as this could have been a “big case” if the cat had rabies. This thought definitely did not make me share my uncle’s optimism. I had heard about those nasty injections, and I also had visions of encountering the Grim Reaper.
Uncle Abe actually did phone his lawyer, one Mr. Moscovitch. I don’t know what Moscovitch told my uncle, but the matter, legal-wise, did not go any further. He likely told my Uncle Abe to keep an eye on me and to give him a call if I started to act strange. Who knows?
Most importantly, I avoided those injections. And I’m still around to tell the tale. But though I think they’re cute and cuddly, I still am not 100 per cent comfortable with cats. No clue why Gaston lunged at me during the game. It’s not like I wore a Maple Leafs sweater.
Here concludes my tale of two catties. Actually, I just noticed I mentioned four cats. Two in Turkey, one in India and that rogue puddy tat, Gaston. My bad. Hey, I’m not Charles Dickens. Please send me your comments and I shall personally respond and seek your forgiveness.
Meow!
Marcel Strigberger retired from his Greater Toronto Area litigation practice and continues the more serious business of humorous author and speaker. His book, Boomers, Zoomers, and Other Oomers: A Boomer-biased Irreverent Perspective on Aging, is available on Amazon (e-book) and in paper version. His new(!) book First, Let’s Kill the Lawyer Jokes: An Attorney’s Irreverent Serious Look at the Legal Universe is available on Amazon, Apple and other book places. Visit www.marcelshumour.com. Follow him on X @MarcelsHumour.
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