glowing

We got Max a tree. Well, the household now has a Christmas tree but really, who could resist bring such joy to a little orange cat. He is currently lolling under the tree, gently lit by the lights and alternately gazing up into the branches and napping.

This afternoon he came downstairs and hung out with me while I worked. He circled the tree, looking and patting at the branches, all the while giving me the narration. Oh, the chirping. When I went and turned on the lights for him this was another whole dimension to the greatness of the tree. If last year is anything to go by we are in for many an ornament to be found on the floor.

And I only had to yell at him twice today as the tree started to sway and there was a glint of orange higher up in the tree that I was frankly comfortable with. The Max - he is a sweetpea - just an evil sweetpea.

orange

The Max has woken up. You can tell because there is now thumping coming from upstairs and the chattering has started up again. Max likes to narrate his existence - he will tell you all about the things he is looking at under the bed, the things that are happening at the end of the hallway and, if you have time, he will take you on a tour of the house stopping to point out the landmarks along the way.

I was reading a thread earlier today where a new cat owner was wondering how you stopped a cat from 'yowling in the middle of the night'. I stopped reading shortly thereafter as I realized I had no real advice to give. Because Max has always been noisy and I have always responded to his caroling with "Really? What is Max doing?". Also, I have learned to sleep through the midnight singing.

Bird was different. He'd convinced my mother and I that he didn't meow - only made little breathy meeps or humphs - until we took him to the vet for the first time. He stood on my lap in the car and let out this very sad meow. He looked a little nonplussed when our reaction was more amazement that he could speak than sympathy for his position. And really, that was basically the only time he'd make big loud sounds. He didn't like the car, he didn't like his crate and he wanted us to turn the car around and let him go home.

I'm not totally sure what Bird made of Max when he first arrived. He was certainly very interested in the new smells but I think he was a little puzzled by the amount of energy one small orange cat had. At night he took to sleeping on the top of the chest of drawers because he could jump up there but Max could not. A refuge from the rascal kitten.



I think what I'm missing most is just Bird's quiet presence. The fact that when I worked from home he would sleep on the table wrapped around my computer. Or the fact that he often followed me from room to room to keep an eye on what was going on. The fact that you knew he was really upset if he looked at you and meowed with no sound. It is still very surprising to me that he's not around.

And I feel indulgent in this grief. Like I should be doing something else. Something better. Something more socially redeeming... or just something more. But I don't really know how. So instead, I will tell you Bird stories that you have heard before and follow the orange cat around as he shows me all his stuff.

dark days

I'm on a bit of a countdown. I'm going to hit the two month mark on the 15th of this month. I said a final goodbye to my Bird - grey cat par excellence - in the early evening of October 15th and I can't even start to write about it without crying. Even now, with nearly two months gone.

Now Bird had a heart murmur - he was diagnosed about 4 years ago and even though the vet said that it was something we just had to monitor and it was pretty typical for boy-cats I knew that this was what was going to get him in the end. We'd seen it with Gumpy - my mother's cat - where there would be a sudden decline as the heart went into failure and then you'd just have to say goodbye. But Birdy was such a big presence that it never really sunk in. I was distressed but it didn't linger because the Bird had decided it was time to go home and lie on the couch - so we did.

The Bird was a big believer in the couch as a place to be. When we lived on Sorauren, just the two of us, there was the side of the couch that was mine and the side that was his. Occasionally, he would come and sit on my lap but mostly he was very convivial and curled up beside me, gently snoring.

When we moved to Dovercourt, that specific couch had to go live at my parent's house as it wouldn't fit up the very narrow staircase. In it's place we got a futon - which didn't divide as neatly in two as the previous couch. So Bird decided that if I was going to lie on the couch he was going to lie on me. We spent many a weekend morning that way - me watching television and very carefully drinking tea and him with his head tucked up under my chin snoozing. Even the advent of the terrible orange kitten didn't change that.

With this last move, the old couch returned due to wider doorways but there were more cats and more people so we didn't fall back into the my side/his side pattern of before. And there were fewer mornings with just the two of us watching tv and drinking tea. But he was happy. He had a whole new set of people and cats to rule over and the occasional different lap.

It all started to go downhill when he woke me up one morning at about 6, panting heavily and generally miserable. He was like that when I got up for real at 8 too. So we popped him in the car and took him to the vet. After a week of being sick to my stomach and daily phone calls from the vet we finally had a concrete diagnosis. He was in heart failure. And while we couldn't fix that we could get set him up with heart meds and a special diet and see where that went.

Sadly, where it went was kidney failure and a week after we'd had him home he stopped eating and we had to take him back to the vet where it became clear that we really had very few options.

So my mom took me up and we said goodbye. And now, nearly two months later I still can't stop crying and it hasn't really sunk in. So there we are.

Dark days indeed.