She came to us quite by accident. Or perhaps it was fate. Who the hell really knows about these things? Our last cat had died two years earlier and we were not looking for a replacement after having her with us for 20 years (details in an old thread).
In 2010, some people bought the rental house next door to us in Portland and moved with their two daughters, a granddaughter, and a menagerie of cats and dogs. We didn’t pay a lot of attention, other than to note that they let their cats roam outdoors. Time went by and cats died from automobiles, but their little black cat seemed to survive most everything.
Eventually, we started seeing her on our back deck and also sleeping on one of the porch rockers in front. As such things often go, we invited her in from time to time and she seemed to be making our home her second home. The little girl next door would come over to claim her in the afternoon, but the cat was clearly bonding with us. Time moved on.
The little girl decided she had to have a kitten, despite the black cat being her pet. “Kitty” took exception to that and began spending even more time with us. Then came more chaos in an already chaotic home. The woman divorced the man and they put the house on the market. Talking to her, it was clear that they were going to move across country and didn’t want to be burdened with animals and hinted darkly that Kitty might just end up being left at a rest area somewhere (yes, they were just that heartless with pets). So one day I told her that we were willing to be Kitty’s new home.
Over the next eight years, she became our best friend and traveling companion, going with us on annual RV trips to the coast and elsewhere. She wasn’t always a willing traveler, but she wanted to be wherever we were and loved sniffing new and exotic smells through the screen windows of the RV. At home, she slept with us every night and was upset if we left the house for any length of time. On our first checkup with the vet we changed the spelling of her name from “Kitty” to a more exotic “Q’itih”.
She (and we) made our last RV trip two years ago in a move to Minneapolis and an apartment. It was a big change for all of us, but I felt bad that she could no longer go outside and roll around on the warm concrete, sniff the cat mint, and hide in the flower beds to watch those stupid dogs go by. But she had her tower to climb up on to look out upon the strange new world and dream of other days. She always liked young children and made friends with my grandkids, and even came to tolerate the cleaning woman.
The about a year ago we started noticing little changes in her behavior. As time went on they became more pronounced and we finally took her to the vet. The vet said she suspected a brain lesion and told us the options, all of which were fairly draconian. We opted not to put the cat (or us) through that. As the months went by, her coordination got worse, and her leg strength diminished. She quit using her tower, but could still jump up on the bed to sleep with us. Then she couldn’t do that and we bought cat stairs for her, which she was able to use for quite awhile. Then recently she was unable to navigate those either. While she was still eating, it was clear she was losing weight and we knew that we had to make a decision that was best for her and not for us.
A week ago she picked up her stuffed mouse, which she has not touched in at least a year, and brought it to me. It was heartbreaking and I took it as a sign that she was ready to leave us. A few days ago it came to a head and we made the appointment. Today we took her in for a very humane end of life.
Such a sweet, good-natured girl she was, and we’ll miss her terribly. But I know that it was the right thing to do for a friend who was suffering. Her ashes will have a place of honor alongside our last cat and my wife’s dog of many decades ago, and her mouse will be by her side. Goodbye little friend.
