We saw this coming for a year now. You fought the cancer as long as you could but as with all bad diseases, it finally claimed you.
I discovered Eightball and his 2 littermates, Tigger and Molly, in the rafters of my garage a few days after they were born. His feral mom Blackie thought it was a safe place to raise a litter. It worked, up until the point where you could climb over the walls of the box that I placed you in to keep you from falling out of the rafters. I knew you before your eyes were even open, and snatched you away from your mom on the day that you ate your first bite of cat food. She was a bad influence.....
You and your brother Tigger were the most playful kittens we've ever had. Then in spite of being neutered, you hit maturity and became one of the most skittish cats that I've known. You never hid from me, that is, unless I was trying to pick you up to take you to the vet. Somehow you always read my mind on those days. You always gave the biggest fights at the vet, and they realized on the second visit that it was best to just sedate you when you came in the door. You had a lot of spunk!
It took you 12 years to realize that the rest of the big scary humans in the world weren't all that scary and you started to hang out with them. You even climbed into your dad's lap the other night (for the first time in 13 years). You were just a late bloomer.
But in spite of all of your fears and spunk, you were always just a big goof ball. I saw the true side of you all these years, and will sorely miss the way that you would wiggle anytime I tried to wrestle you into actually sitting in my lap (instead of pacing across it). You did give me a lot of giggles over the years.
I wrote this limerick about him a few years ago when there was a contest on this site. It has always fit his personality.
Eightball never ever sits still
He sometimes can be quite the pill.
But a cat that wiggles
Can give me the giggles
And stops me from wanting to kill.
I love you my baby. You were, and will always be my little goof ball!!
from me and the crew.
