- Joined
- Jun 28, 2015
- Messages
- 32
- Purraise
- 25
This little girl was amazing. She was only a cat, but she was special. She had her quirks and smiles. Actually they weren't her smiles, they were mine - because she gave them to me. She was a tiny little thing. She loved cat food. My big 12 year old PHAT cat (“Carrots”) loves kitten food. Go figure.
Patches was born on May 24, 2015. It was on a Sunday. There were four babies in the litter altogether. When I got home from church, Suzie Q (mama cat) was laying in my front yard with four new babies. I named all of them.
Papa cat was solid black with a little white spot under his neck, and a white streak down his belly. The first one was a twin for papa cat, whom I call "Big Boy." Therefore, I named him "Little Boy."
The second one was a solid white female with black spots - ala "101 Dalmatians." So I named her "Misses." Pongo was the male, after all.
Little Boy & Misses died within the first 24 hours. I buried them side by side. I marked their grave with a long, straight rock. I took a second one and scratched a little sign of a cross on the first one. Then I said a little prayer for them.
Kitten #3 was a male who looked exactly like “Carrots,” my 12 year old cat. Both of them are black & silver tabbies, with an slight orange hue about them, so of course I named him "Cauliflower" (it was the vegetable next name in line, I suppose). He died when he was three weeks old and I buried him next to his brother and sister.
The last one left ("Patches") developed an eye infection. I first spotted it on her at about three weeks. Her right eye was closed with a bit of a crusty coating over her right eye. It wouldn't open.
So I called the vet. They said to wipe her eye out with a warm damp cloth (which I had been doing) and put wetting eye-drops in her eyes.
This seemed to work but it would only last for a couple of hours before her eye would become crusted over and close again. After about four days of this, I called the vet back and explained that it wasn't working. So I drove to the office and bought a small bottle of antibiotic eye drops.
They said to put it in her eyes approximately 3 to 4 times per day. Which I did, and within about three days it was gone and her eyes were clear. By then she was almost five weeks old.
On the day she turned five weeks, I caught her on top of the tall box I had been keeping her in on my front porch. She had her hind paws over the edge and was about to make a run for the border. Rather than letting her get away and have something unthinkable happen, I brought her inside. Big mistake. It didn’t take long before I was hooked.
It was then that I took mama cat (“Suzie Q”) to Help for Animals and had her spayed. No more kittens (solved that little dilemma) and she has since become a happy little porch kitty.
The day before her seventh week "birthday, she became very lethargic and laid around almost constantly like my 12 year old cat (which I thought wasn't normal - she should have been playing and having fun). Not to mention that she was “shivering.” Needless to say, I was getting worried. This was on Saturday evening. I took her to the vet first thing on Monday. She was running a fever of 104° - 101° is considered normal for a cat but that’s still a substantial fever.
My vet came up with three liquid syringes of worm medicine. He gave her the first dose & handed me the other two to give her over the next two days. He also gave her the first of 10 doses of a liquid antibiotic and handed me the other nine to give to her once per day until they were gone (that was fun). When I mentioned that her stool had been somewhat runny, he handed me a new clean syringe and said to give her about 2 cc's of Pepto-Bismol. I don't think she liked the cherry flavored variety, but it solved the problem within a matter of hours.
I also bought some of that Kitten Milk Replacement (in powdered form that I had to mix with water) and fed it to her about three times per day.
When I gave her the KMR, she’d stick her face in it and appeared to inhale it all - as opposed to drinking it. It was funny to watch.
She followed me around everywhere. I constantly had to check behind my ankles (that's where she liked to be) to make sure I didn't step on her.
At night she would lie on my neck and go to sleep. I was becoming more hooked on her by the hour, it seemed. I’m such a softie. After fixing her ailments (or so I thought at the time), she started laying under my shoulder at night to go to sleep.
She loved to give me kisses. Real kisses. Right on the mouth. If I puckered up at her, she would immediately stop whatever she was doing and come up to give me more kisses. But when she tried to do the French kissing thing I drew the line.
When I'd sit at the kitchen table doing my Bible study & devotions, she would climb up my leg, get on my lap and pull down on my shirt and look me in the eye. Time for more kisses. After going to bed, she liked to climb up the far side of the bed (next to the wall) to let me know she was there. More kisses, of course.
When I tried to watch TV - be it on the couch or in bed - she would attack whichever hand was using the remote control. Sometimes I'd grab a different remote with my other hand to try and distract her from the one I actually using. It never worked for long. After about five seconds of it, she'd around and pounce on the original hand, biting away. Not hard, but her teeth were a little sharp.
After about 10 minutes of fun, she’d settle beside of me for the night. She crawled under the covers and slept next to my feet. But she only did that for about three nights.
In our last few nights together, she laid on the top of the covers next to my right hip and watched TV with me. It didn't matter what was on, she'd lay right there and watch it with me.
No matter how late I stayed in the bed after waking up, she never left my side. If I stayed in bed until 2:00 o'clock in the afternoon, she was right there with me. She wouldn't get up until I did. Needless to say, I was hopelessly falling for this little girl more and more .
I kept her kitten food bowl in the hallway next to my bedroom. Whenever I was in the area, she’d come to her bowl and start to eat. It didn't take long until I figured out that she was doing it just to be close to me.
Whenever I squeezed her little Star Trek “tribble” to make it squeak and throw it across the room, she’d chase it down and wrestle with it for a minute or so. She liked to look up at me to see if I was watching her "being cute." Silly girl. Not to mention the fun we had with a laser pointer.
When she wrestled with my hand, she'd paw & dig at me with her paws the way cats like to do. She never, ever scratched me – not once. You’d swear she was declawed - she wasn't. She was that gentle.
I took her to Help for Animals to have her spayed on Monday, August 24th. She was such a little sweetheart. It was over an hour's drive but she never made a sound from her pet carrier all the way there. She trusted me. I dropped her off at 8:00 am and went to run various errands throughout the day until it was time to pick her up at 4:00 o'clock.
When I got back, instead of bringing her out (like they did for all of the other pets), they told me that I needed to come back into the exam room. Something was very, very wrong and I knew it. That's when they told me about a condition she had that I had never heard of - Feline Infectious Peritonitis. It's a fatal disease that they said she was apparently born with. So at the tender age of three months she needed to be put down. My heart was broken.
They said I could spend as much time with her as I wanted. I stayed with her for over an hour. I cried like a little baby. Here I am a 56 year old man & I was crying over a little critter. She wrapped herself around my neck and purred as loud as I'd ever heard her do. She was kissing me over and over and over. It was like she knew that the jig was up and this was goodbye.
Then - she was gone. She lived only three short months. It didn’t seem fair. She was just a baby and now she's gone. Every morning when I wake up I kept expecting her to be by my side. But she's not and will never be again. She trusted me and it feels like I let her down. I know that I didn’t, but it felt like I had anyway.
I got a card in the mail from Help for Animals a few days ago. On the front are a dog and a cat with angel’s wings looking up at a rainbow-lit sky with the words “The Best Friends We Once Held Close Are Now Our Guardian Angels.” On the inside it says “Memory is the yesterday that gives us courage for tomorrow. We hope that the sadness you’re feeling will soon give way to fond memories.” It was signed by the whole staff. It was indeed comforting.
I’ve written this about her not to lament her death but to celebrate her life, be it ever so brief. She was a precious little thing like I’ve never had and maybe never will again. She’s a tough act to follow.
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I've long felt that the unconditional love of a pet is the closest thing we have to the love of God on earth. To me, it's love beyond measure.
