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Photo by Kris Weston<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n The inspiration of a little cat has led to a big bonus for both his rescue organization and the life of his adoptive mom.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen Freddie and I go for our daily strolls around the retirement community where we live, people love to ask \u2018How\u2019s Freddie?\u2019\u201d begins Joanne Gobbi\u2019s winning story in the Petco Foundation\u2019s<\/a>\u00a02016 Holiday Wishes Campaign<\/a>. Gobbi was one of 54 finalists in the contest whose winning stories about how their rescued pets changed their lives received grants for the rescue group or shelter where the adoption took place.<\/p>\n Gobbi\u2019s story tells how she adopted Freddie, a coal-black cat who was amazingly calm at the presentation of the $5,000 grant to Helen Sanders Cat Paws<\/a>\u00a0at the Petco located at the Marina Shores Center at Second Street and PCH. Gobbi had lost her beloved cat, Ozzie, to an illness in August 2015, and she was devastated to the point of not being able to even look at a cat without crying.<\/p>\n Gobbi describes herself as a \u201ctypical cat person\u2014private, shy and introverted.\u201d A few years before Ozzie\u2019s death, she\u2019d lost her mother, to whom she felt close, and isolated herself from neighbors. Ozzie had provided companionship and a haven for her emotions. Gobbi loved the cat as only one who\u2019s loved a pet can understand and was just as devastated by his death.<\/p>\n After her grief had subsided, Gobbi made a New Year\u2019s resolution to start looking online at cats in rescues. \u201cMind you, I was only going to look,\u201d she insisted. But ooking at photos just reminded her of Ozzie and how none of the pictures measured up.<\/p>\n One day, Gobbi just happened to be at the Marina Shores Petco for no reason that she could give an explanation for, but you know where this is going. Helen Sanders CatPAWS, a nonprofit volunteer cat-rescue-and-welfare organization, centered in Seal Beach, has an adoption center there, and Freddie was in one of the little condos.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u201cThere he was, my next true love,\u201d Gobbi wrote. \u201cWhen Freddie turned those stunning green eyes on me, I felt my heart melt, and I knew this was the cat for me. I was sure that finding a forever home with me would change his life; what I wasn\u2019t prepared for was how much my life would change because of him.\u201d<\/p>\n The volunteers at the rescue warned Gobbi that Freddie was inclined to be feisty and attempt to dart out the door, but Gobbi found a way to respond to Freddie\u2019s need for adventure and the outdoors. She taught him to wear a harness and walk on a leash\u2014no mean feat or paws\u2014and strolled around her retirement community with him. Soon, she found herself opening up to her neighbors and passing forward the joys of cat personhood.<\/p>\n \u201cBeing in a retirement community, I noticed that many of the residents had given up pet ownership because they were physically unable to care for them,\u201d Gobbi wrote. \u201cSeeing and petting Freddie gives them a great deal of joy and reminds them of pets they once had.\u201d<\/p>\n Petco staff, Petco Foundation representatives, Helen Sanders CatPAWS volunteers and winning-story writer Joanne Gobbi gathered for the awards presentation. Freddie even said a couple of words. Photo by Kris Weston.<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cOur staff read all of the stories, and we all had tissue boxes at hand,\u201d said Mary Ann Magana, the grant-administration manager for the Petco Foundation. \u201cWe are now able to award CatPAWS with a grant because of this story.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Magana said that funds for the Petco Foundation are raised through customer donations at the registers at each of Petco\u2019s 1,400 locations. Shoppers are requested at checkout to make a donation for a homeless animal; all money collected goes to rescues like Cat PAWS as well as other rescues and shelters, adoption, spay\/neuter procedures, pet-cancer research, and pet-therapy- and service-animal organizations. Since 1999, the Petco Foundation has raised over $170 million dollars in this way.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n At the ceremony, Magana thanked the Petco staff members for asking customers to donate toward these efforts. CatPAWS cofounder Annelle Baum thanked the Foundation for the grant, and Gobbi and Freddie for story and the inspiration, respectively.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe are grateful and honored to receive a $5,000 grant from the Petco Foundation in its Holiday Wishes campaign for the poignant story submitted by Joanne, about how Freddie has changed her life,\u201d reads a post on Cat PAWS\u2019 Facebook page<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n As for Joanne Gobbi, she\u2019s received her own grant in the form of Freddie the cat, and her neighbors share in it.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cBecause of Freddie, I now have a wide circle of \u2018cat people\u2019 friends, and my life has been immeasurably enriched,\u201d Gobbi wrote.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Love does not come in finite, limited quantities.<\/p>\n Joanne Gobbi\u2019s story can be read in full here<\/a><\/i>.<\/p>\n \u00a0 To help support the Petco Foundation, please accept the invitation to donate at checkout. You can purchase one of these calendars at any of the stores as well.<\/i><\/p>\n And you can have one calendar in each room! Helen Sanders CatPAWS is offering an end-of-the-year sale for their Show Us Your Kitties Calendar. All funds go to help with adoption, vet bills and spay\/neuter for the CatPAWS cats. To order yours, click on this link<\/a><\/i>.<\/p>\n \u201cOf all God\u2019s creatures there is only one that cannot be made the slave of the leash. That one is the cat.\u201d<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n ~ Mark Twain Notebook, 1894<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n![\"Group](\"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/Group_photo_with_check.jpg\")
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