(Let me begin this column by saying that I do not condone having wild animals as pets. However, to each their own . . .)

I grew up on a farm where I lived until the age of 15 or so. In fact, this farm at the corner of Bradyville Road and South Rutherford Boulevard here in Murfreesboro at one time was close to 800 acres and was part of my great-grandfather Thomas Rogers’ farm that goes back in the family to around 1913.

Naturally, on a farm, we had a lot of animals such as cows, chickens, barn cats and dogs. I grew up with the conventional pets of a dog or two, a cat or a couple of rabbits. Fish made the best pets because I never got too emotionally attached to them and, when they died, you could easily flush them down the toilet.

We also had Polly the parrot, because I had a Great-uncle Curtis who worked the oil fields in Venezuela and he shipped the exotic Amazon parrot home, which was possibly illegal. (I’m guessing Polly the parrot is another story for another day.)

Many of you reading this also probably had a dog, cat, rabbit or tropical fish as a pet.

But this story about a pet belonging to a friend of the family—we will call him Bobby Lee Wilkins to protect his identity—begins now.

Bobby Lee was a good friend of my older brother, Mitch. The two hung out as kids and teenagers in the 1950s and ’60s. What’s fascinating to me is that Bobby Lee later owned a pet mountain lion named Muff.

I remember as a kid going up Bradyville Pike to see what I thought at the time to be a surreal pet mountain lion. One time I watched Bobby Lee feed Muff two whole dead chickens. Now, I don’t know everything about you and your childhood memories, but I’ll bet you don’t know too many people who had a pet mountain lion, especially one named Muff.

I was in awe of Muff and it was cool to me to be able to go down the road to my own personal zoo even though it was just one animal in a huge, fenced-in area. I remember just off in the distance seeing cows in the pasture just outside the confines of where Muff lived. I remember wondering what the cows thought of Muff. I’m pretty sure Muff thought the cows could be lunch if he could only get outside of the cage.

Bobby Lee didn’t grow up on a farm and he wanted something different for a pet. So, through a friend of his, he traveled to Cape Girardeau, Missouri, to an exotic animal sale. He first had to get a license to buy a mountain lion. By going through the proper channels, he bought this 5-to 8-week-old female cougar, or mountain lion, in 1982 and named her Muff. I asked him one time why he named her Muff and he asked, “Why not?”

Bobby Lee told me the story of living at LeBeau Château apartments here in Murfreesboro (where I too have lived at one time) in the 1980s. Muff used a large litter box while Bobby Lee was away at work. He told me this one particular story of being at work and getting a call from the apartment manager that there had been an accident. Bobby Lee had forgotten that the exterminator would be stopping by the apartment complex to spray for insects. When the bug man had bent over to spray in his apartment, Muff took this as a threat and she trounced on him. This was not good at all. The exterminator didn’t take too kindly to Muff attacking him and he was threatening to sue Bobby Lee.

What’s wild, and what turns a bad story to a heartening one, is that the bug man’s kids found out about Muff and they went to visit her along with their dad. They all fell in love with her and eventually all was well.

Bobby Lee was able to stay at LeBeau Château; however, Muff had to go and he moved to a large outdoor pen off Bradyville Pike at his grandparents’ home (this is where I met Muff).

Bobby Lee would frequent the Campus Pub over by MTSU, a local beer joint with pool tables. Muff had a collar and a leash so the cougar would go into the pub with her human and Muff would lay in the corner in the pool room until some patron would start to mess with her and Muff and Bobby Lee would have to leave before more trouble broke out.

Muff, whose front paws had been declawed but who still had her back claws and her teeth, went everywhere with Bobby Lee, like a pet dog. She was like a domesticated pet and even slept with Bobby Lee. Even in the enclosed area she had the freedom to move around. Her diet consisted of two raw chickens daily, including the bones.

Bobby Lee kept Muff until 1989. Bobby Lee got tired of maintaining Muff and he found an individual in Lexington, Tennessee to take her, then weighing 150 pounds. Muff lived the rest of her life on a farm there and Bobby Lee received an $800 check yearly for the sale of one of her cubs.

I’ve always been fascinated with this, ever since the first time I got to see Muff. I just found it hard to believe someone had a pet cougar. By the way, mountain lions, cougars and pumas all refer to the same species . . . other than, I believe, a cougar has something to do with a connotation of an older woman interested in younger men.

So, now you know the story of Muff the Mountain Lion. The moral to the story is: Stick to dogs, cats, tropical fish and parrots, and stay away from keeping mountain lions unless you have the time, money and patience to raise one.

(The name Bobby Lee is a fictitious one; however, he is a very real person; Muff the Mountain Lion is the real name. No animals were hurt during the telling of this story.)