Well, obvious answer, he’s a cat. Yeah, no, I’m going to give you the full story.
First and foremost, Finian is a white tom cat with heterochromia, one eye being blue and the other a gold-green, who is deaf and FIV positive. For those unaware, male white cats with either blue or heterochromia eyes tend to be deaf due to their genetics. FIV, or Feline Immunodeficiency Virus, is the cat version of HIV; just like with HIV, it is only transmittable through exchange of blood or saliva or other bodily fluids. I’ve met people who have asked me if Finian is contagious and explain that, no, he is not contagious like the flu. Petting him then petting your own cat will not transmit it. Finian appears to be asymptomatic and the only sign that he has FIV is that he constantly has goop in his eyes which is common with FIV positive cats. Other than that, Finian is no different from any other cat.
Finian was a stray for around five years before he decided to approach a woman who managed to catch him and take him to a non-kill, non-profit shelter. Seeing him, a big white cat, walk out of the forest reminded her of a Yeti so that’s what she named him, Yeti. The shelter cares for animals with various conditions like FIV and Feline Leukemia and ensure they are all healthy. FIV positive cats can live with other FIV positive cats without worry of transmitting the virus, but ultimately Finian did not have a good time with them. The other cats he shared a room with could tell that he was deaf and bullied him. Ultimately, they moved Finian to a separate room where they kept the food for all the animals and he was quite happy there; there was a built-in enclosure attached to the kitchen area that allowed him to go to an outside play area that he could have fun in whenever he wanted. He wasn’t lonely either since employees came in and out pretty often and he had a neighbor behind a baby gate, an elderly, blind basset hound.
So how did I find Finian? Well, that story goes all the way back to high school. I’d gotten my learner’s permit but the idea of driving never sat well with me. Ultimately, I decided not to do my hours until my second year in college. During the fall of my sophomore year of college, I told my parents that I wanted a cat to live with me in the dorms because I was stressed and I needed something to help me feel at peace. My parents said I could have a cat, on one condition: I had to get my driver’s license. When winter break came around, I grabbed my Dad and told him to get in the car. Overall, getting my hours was fine but I lacked motivation. So, my mom and I decided to begin searching for my cat. We went to our local SPCA and one the next county over but I didn’t have a connection with any of the cats. They were all very sweet and deserved a home but none of them were quite right. I knew that I didn’t want a kitten because they required more care which wouldn’t work out well with my classes and I was personally more interested in a Special Needs cat. Come summer, we’d had no luck but then my mother’s dentist mentioned adopting a dog from a shelter out in the middle of nowhere.
My mother and I drove out to the shelter only for our GPS to crap out on us because we were in the middle of nowhere but I managed to get us there somehow. Before we’d made the trip, we had called the shelter and told them what I was looking for in a cat and they played match maker like they were setting up two people on a date. They had a list of cats for us to meet when we got there. To say I was excited would have been an understatement. And the very first cat we met was Yeti.
It was literally love at first sight. He came up to me. All the employees told me that he was usually standoffish with them and I knew he was meant for me. But I knew I had to give the other cats a chance to make an impression so we went and saw the other contestants. They were all sweet and adorable and just precious and deserve good homes, but I was set. Yeti was my cat. We went back to his room before we left and he climbed onto my lap without any prompting and decided he was going to stay there. I still have the scars from where his claws dug in, but I was stupid for wearing shorts to an animal shelter but it was worth it.
I went back to see Yeti two times after that, once to let my dad meet him and once to see how he got along with May the Chihuahua. Both went really well, especially the meeting of cat and dog; May went right up and licked him and he let her. It was basically set in stone, we were adopting him. Now I just needed my driver’s license.
Come July, I had my license. And, the very next day, I was driving out to pick up Yeti. So, in between finding Yeti and picking him up, I had been pondering his name. Yeti was… fine, but he didn’t look like a ‘Yeti’. After first meeting him, I began brainstorming names. I had a few based on my favorite Marvel Cinematic Universe characters (Loki, Bucky, Winter) then just some random ones like Snow or Barnaby then I went looking at names with color meanings because I was very into RWBY at the time. Names related to the color white were rather plain (Gwyn, Whitney, Weiss) but then I found one with the meaning “little white one”. The Gaelic name Finian. It was perfect, especially with my love of Celtic Mythology.
And that’s the story of Finian the cat. I’ve got a boatload of other stories about his shenanigans like the time he decided he didn’t like the origins of his name and ate the cover of my Celtic mythology book. Yeah, I’m still not sure what he was trying to say with that. Maybe sometime I’ll post some more stories about my boy!
Thanks for reading! If you have any questions, feel free to ask!
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