The Cat Distribution System apparently has agents everywhere. Even airports.
This cat tale begins when Virgil Wiebe, a law professor at the University of St. Thomas, was trying to get home to St. Paul after attending a conference in New York City last month. Due to a flight delay in New York that caused him to miss a connecting flight in Chicago, he ended up spending the night in Chicago before attempting to resume his journey the next day via another flight out of Chicago O’Hare International Airport.
“I got to the airport well over two hours early, so I wandered down to the end of Terminal 1 and went outside to finish my coffee and smoke a cigar,” he said.
You might be picturing a tarmac and airplanes, but Wiebe was hanging out near a bit of green space, with a dog run and some grass and hedges. A place where a cat might roam. And then …
“I was about to head back into the terminal when this kitten charged up to me and onto my foot,” Wiebe says.
The orange furball was perhaps just a few weeks old, a bit smudged with dirt but sociable, with no sign of siblings or a mother nearby.
The professor saw no other option:
“What are you going to do?” he asked. “He was sort of at the height of cuteness, he was purring like a motor and immediately captured my heart. I picked him up.”
Wiebe wasn’t sure what the airport could do to assist a small, stray traveler with fur and whiskers — was this a case for lost and found? — but he went into the terminal with the kitten and the duo conferred with everyone from TSA agents to baggage claim folks to ticket agents. Everyone agreed the kitten was adorable, but this was an unusual situation with no clear or quick solution.
“My wife said, ‘Can you bring him home?’” Wiebe recalls of the text that changed everything.
It was meant to be a joke, he learned later. A moment lost in translation?
“I took it as a green light,” he said.
This is how the Cat Distribution System works, as it is called on the Internet, a term describing the surprising or random ways cats find their ways into our lives. It happens every day, and on Sept. 29 it was Wiebe’s turn.
By this time, the airport staff and the professor had all fallen in love with the kitten, but the little guy needed a carrier to travel by air. Interestingly, the airport’s spare kennel had been given away earlier that day after someone tried to bring a cat aboard a flight without one.
Now, Wiebe wonders: Could this kitten somehow be connected to that sneaky traveler? Maybe they didn’t want to pay two cat traveling fees of $150 each? He’ll never know.
What he did know was that this kitten definitely needed a carrier to board the cabin of soon-to-depart United Airlines Flight 467 bound for Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.
Fortunately, his Gen Z daughter back in St. Paul knew how to help from her phone: She placed a DoorDash order from Petco for a travel carrier, along with kitten formula and a bottle.
While he and the kitten waited outside for the delivery, they made the acquaintance of two cops on traffic duty who said they’d never seen a stray cat at the airport before. However, an exotic green bird on the loose at O’Hare reportedly caused a commotion earlier this month, going viral and making the news as the feathers flew. And a Google search reveals cats going missing at airports around the world while in transit. While this orange guy was surely not the first stray cat to find a home with an airline traveler, he might be the cutest airport stray. At least, Wiebe thought so as he boarded the flight with his new family member. Others agreed.
“Everyone who meets him falls in love with him,” Wiebe said.
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The kitten was a well-behaved traveler.
“He just curled up in his kennel,” said Wiebe.
Back home in St. Paul, the kitten was checked out by a veterinarian, treated for fleas and named Macanudo O’Hare after the airport and the name of the cigar brand Wiebe was smoking; he’s called Harry for short.
Since Wiebe is currently on sabbatical, Harry — who likes to perch on Wiebe’s shoulder — is a cat about town right now, serving as a goodwill ambassador of sorts, from a regular stop at a local mosque to greet people attending services (he’s a big hit with the young people) to canvassing the neighborhood to remind people to vote to hosting a democracy party on the family’s deck.
Harry just needs to improve his polling numbers with one group: The family’s other cats, Sweet Corn and Lobster Tail. Hopefully the pair will come around, as they too benefited from the Cat Distribution System, finding a home with the family seven years ago as the surprise offspring of a neighbor’s former stray cat.