Goodbye Indiana Joan

My feral girl, whom I've been caretaker of for over 17 years died this afternoon. She came out for her morning feeding this morning and was walking around the deck as any other day. She hasn't been more than about 20 feet from our deck for the last 4 years and we found her about 100 yards from the house in a coma under a tree early this afternoon. She obviously wandered off to die. I held her on the way to the e-vets and realized that is the longest that I had physical contact with her for 17 years. She passed peacefully from just the sedative shot.

I let her cat friends Bob Marley and Lucky Pierre have their goodbye's with her when we got home. Bob, who is dieing from cancer, has known her his entire life (12 years) and followed us out as we buried her under a silver maple tree. Indie always like to lie under silver maples.

Indie was our first feral rescue after we moved to this part of the world. We tried to acclimate to her be an indoor cat many times, and she would never have anything to do with it. So we built her an outdoor shelter, heated in the winter and gave her a heated bed and heated water bowl.

My emotions are in so many places right now. I have felt guilt for many years for not forcing her inside my home, but knew her well enough to know that is not what she wanted from life, even as winters got harder and harder on her. She was plagued with respiratory and skin allergies all her life and by all rights should have died years ago (she wasn't easy to medicate). I know that many feral cats don't live this long, and that only confirms my thoughts that I allowed her to live the life she wanted to live. While it's hard to bond with a cat who won't let you really touch them, I can't help be completely sad about her passing. I'm glad that she is at peace without suffering at the end.

Here's to you my little girl. Romp happily over the bridge. I'll light a candle for you tonight.

I had the weirdest moment this morning when I realized I had no more feral cats to feed outside. On the one hand I'm very sad, and on the other hand comforted that I successfully speutered an entire colony long ago enough that I don't have to worry (cross fingers) about more feral cats in my area. Indie was the last of what was once a fairly large colony. I feel that a dynasty has ended. I no longer live in an area where feral cats congregate - too many coyotes and dogs in the neighborhood to make it safe for them to wander onto our property.

Thanks everyone for your comforting thoughts.