January Volunteer of the Month: Sally Fessler

Sally began volunteering at APS last April because she and her daughter were interested in volunteering together over the summer.  Her mother Margaret has since joined their family team!  Sally and her family have adopted two cats and two dogs from APS over the years and chose to volunteer at APS because of their, “admiration for the important work the fantastic staff at APS does and our gratitude to the shelter for providing us with such a wonderful animal family!”

Sally does so much at APS! Her favorite job is socializing cats in our adoptable cat rooms. “It just feels great to go in to cuddle, play with and share the love with the cats we can’t adopt personally,” she says. She also writes a blog for adoptable cats, assists our cat foster homes and coordinates a monthly community cat adoption event where APS foster and shelter cats go out on the town one Sunday each month to encourage adoptions.

“John Valentine of the Regulator Bookshop has kindly allowed us to bring in several foster and shelter cats for two Sunday afternoon visitations in his store.  We have had a warm and receptive audience of Regulator staff and shoppers and we hope that this new program will encourage more adoptions of our cats.  We love to have visitors, who are welcome to sit with the cats and learn more about our adoption programs, fostering and volunteer opportunities.  It is so much fun to get the cats out in the community, sitting on the sofas at the back of the bookstore and checking out the surroundings.  They seem to enjoy themselves and so do we!” she says.

Sally has three animals at home; two cats, O Henry (orange tabby) and Ozzie (black DSH), and a dog, Otis (black lab mix). O Henry and Otis are APS alums and Ozzie came into her life when her neighbor had to move.

“The first cats I fell in love with during my tenure as a volunteer were playpen-mates Simon and Morey.  Simon was a young grey DSH, a perky little guy who loved to ride on your shoulder or walk around in your arms.  Morey was a placid, longhaired, yellow and white adult, who was perfect for my mother to pet, since she uses a walker and couldn’t go running around after a wiggly feline.  You could trust Morey to stay in her lap for as long as she felt like petting him.  It was so gratifying to have them move together to become Stephanie’s office cats for awhile and then to be adopted together into the same home!  What a storybook ending for a great pair of cats!”

Sally is originally from Kansas where she served four years in the Peace Corps in Kenya as an English teacher and school headmistress.  She was an occupational therapist for ten years but switched careers in the mid 90′s and is now a reference librarian, working as a sub for Durham County Library.  She loves her job, which is challenging, interesting and flexible.  She and her husband, David Kirkpatrick, have one daughter, Grace, who is a 9th grader at DSA.  Her hobbies include knitting, beer-brewing, cooking, and sewing.