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The vet called me this morning just as I was walking up the sidewalk to go in to my office and told me that when they came in this morning and checked on Gremlin, he had passed away at some point during the night. He was in a comfortable position and didn't look at all distressed, so Dr. Ricky is fairly sure he went peacefully.
What hurts so much is that he went alone.
Maybe it'll help me to type the technical explanation. Or maybe not. But here it is.
Gremlin had a heart murmur. Dr. Ricky first told me about it 4 years ago when we moved to Atlanta. It was mild and he said that it eventually would cause problems, but not for years. Then, Gremlin developed hyperthyroidism, which basically means that his metabolism sped up too much. His heart pumped faster, his blood flowed faster, his kidneys worked faster, etc. But since the heart was damaged, the faster metabolism caused it to age faster than it would otherwise have done. The increased blood flow caused by the hyperthyroidism actually caused the murmur to go away.
Then we started medicating him for the thyroid problem and the blood flow got back to normal...and the heart problem came back with a vengeance.
Dr. Ricky thinks that Gremlin's poor heart just finally couldn't take any more, and that's why he was panting and sitting oddly and not eating. He just wasn't feeling 'right.'
I guess it did help to type that because, as Dr. Ricky said, at least I know it wasn't something I did--in fact, we were just trying to help him.
But now I have my memories. [Note: This is mostly therapeutic for me. Now would be the time to skip if you want to avoid a lot of maudlin stuff.]
Tiny little newborn kitten with his eyes and ears pinched tightly shut hissing and spitting as only a kitten can....
4-week old kitten boldly going out of the box where he and his mother and three siblings lived and looking around completely unafraid. Spokeskitten of the entire litter.
The look of relief on a tiny, furry face as the flea medicine started to work and the dozens of fleas infesting his tiny body started to die or leave.
The look on Stacy's face (Stacy was my next-door-neighbor who took Gremlin's mother and all four kittens in just after they were born) when she told me she needed a home for the last kitten, because the guy she'd lined up fell through, and how I said yes mostly because she asked me.
The feel of that tiny little guy in my hand. His whole body fit in my hand.
Him lying flat on his back asleep in my lap, all four pink paws up, in an attitude of complete trust, occasionally kneading the air or making little sucking noises as he "dreamed."
Waking up to find a kitten nursing on my earlobe, kneading my face with his little paws, and purring as he 'nursed.'
Playing 'elevator.' He was so young, and he didn't know he was a cat and could climb and jump, so he'd crawl up onto my shoe and I'd raise my leg parellel to the floor with him balanced on my shoe and he'd walk up my leg to get into my lap.
How he stayed within 3 feet of me at all times for the first few weeks of our lives together.
How he made his 'first kill.'My mother and her friend Peggy were at my apartment visiting and we all had sandwiches from Subway. Peggy had a 6-inch Turkey sandwich. I had my back turned working on the computer while Peggy and my mother ate and watched TV. Next thing I know, I hear Peggy exclaiming, and I turned around in time to see Gremlin with the entirety of the meat (turkey) of Peggy's sandwich in his mouth, dragging it across the floor with it between his front legs like a leopard with a dead antelope. I accused Peggy of having given it to him, saying, "I was trying to keep him from getting used to people food!" Peggy said, "He TOOK my SANDWICH! Just crawled up here, grabbed the end, tugged until all the meat came out, growled, and ran off with it! Don't accuse me of giving him anything!" He always loved turkey from that day.
The first time he visited my mother's house and realized that he was a cat. My mother has a cat, Babes, who is a little older than Gremlin. She was a feral rescue. Gremlin was about 4 months old. Gangly and teenaged. He was utterly fascinated by Babes. He followed her around everywhere she went. She'd hiss at him and he'd just look at her. She'd slap him and he'd just lie on the floor and look at her. Finally, she jumped up on the counter to get away. I could see it in his eyes. "Whoa. I wish I could do that! Wait a second. She's a cat...I'm a cat...she jumped up there...which means...*leap* He walked around on counters and tables and such from that day forward.
The night he saw "another cat" in the dark sliding glass door and attacked his own reflection.
The day he leaped off the balcony. I put him on my second-floor balcony because he loved the fresh air, but I didn't want him "outside." It never entered my head that the stupid cat would jump off, but he did. When I realized he wasn't on the balcony, I panicked and ran downstairs...to find him calmly and with fascination sniffing the grass (a new sensation!).
Gremlin's first Christmas. I decided to put up a Christmas tree. I got a real tree, put it in the holder, added water, then got out the decorations I had bought and laboriously and meticulously hung them all on the tree. Gremlin was watching, quietly and intently, from nearby the entire time. I finished the tree and went into the kitchen for something. I was gone...MAYBE one minute. I hear a crash. I go back into the living room where I find Gremlin rummaging around in the now-horizontal tree, playing with the ornaments. There are pine droppings and water all over the carpet. But it was a great adventure for him. He "undecorated" the tree a time or two more before he lost interest. But in all the time I had him, we could never wrap presents with bows. Bows were just too much of a temptation for a frisky cat. And the bottom 2 feet or so of the tree (Gremlin was a LONG cat) always had to stay undecorated.
"Gremlin's Big Adventure." I came home from work one day to find him missing. He ALWAYS sat in the window waiting for me to come home, then met me at the door. But not this day. He wasn't ANYWHERE in the apartment. I panicked and ran outside and started calling for him. Right about this time, Peggy and my mother drove up and saw how upset I was. My mother took me in while Peggy called for Gremlin. He came immediately. He was COVERED in red clay and grease, and had apparently spent most of the day rooting around in the kudzu. He didn't want out for months after that.
How he taught me to fetch. He had a rabbit's foot as a toy. He carried it around everywhere, tossing it, batting it around...it was slimy and disgusting. But he loved it. One day, I was sitting in the living room watching TV. I had my shoes off. Gremlin was nearby, playing with his disgusting toy. Suddenly, I look down, and he has put the thing into my shoe and is rooting around trying to get it out. Disgusted, I reach down and pull it out and toss it away. He brings it back. Puts it in my shoe. I throw it. He brings it back. I guess we taught each other. He did this for a few years, until he was 6 or 7 years old. One time (and only once), I was telling someone about how he could fetch and they didn't believe me. So, jokingly, I said, "Gremlin, go get your rabbit's foot!" and he ran out of the room like a shot. A few seconds later, he came back, with the foot in his mouth, and he dropped it onto my foot. The expression on my friend's face was worth Gremlin never doing it again.
Gremlin's nervous tic. Gremlin liked to destroy furniture. One day, I had just bought a water pistol to use to 'discourage' this behavior. I filled it up and put it next to my chair. Later, Gremlin comes in and goes up to the new couch, flexes his paws, puts his freshly extracted claws on the couch. I carefully picked up the water pistol. I aimed...and JUST as I fired, he must have seen something out of the corner of his eye, because he turned his head to look at me. And the cold stream of water hit him SQUARELY in his left eye. From then on, all you had to do was show him a gun-shaped anything and his left eye would start to twitch.
Gremlin's first dog. My friend Phil wanted to see if I could keep his dog Max while they were on vacation. I didn't know. Gremlin had never seen a dog. So Phil brought Max over. It...didn't go well. Max was a bouncy-bouncy poodle who wanted nothing more than to play with Gremlin. Gremlin, however, thought Max was a creature from another world. He leaped onto my glass-top dining room table, fluffed his tail out to full fluff, raised all the fur along the ridge of his backbone, and began to make growling sounds and hissing. Max, of course, thought this was fun, so he started to bark. Poor Gremlin.
How he loved to sit and look out my glass doors at the birds, chipmunks and squirrels. He always made little "coughing" or "chittering" noises at them. Later, my mother's friend Anne gave me a 6-hour video tape of birds, fish, bugs, rats, squirrels, etc. made just for cats. Gremlin loved the birds and rats and squirrels. He'd look behind the TV when one ran off the side of the screen.
The day he slapped my friend JP right in the face (JP forgave him because he WAS invading Gremlin's personal comfort zone).
Gremlin playing in the only snow he ever saw. Blizzard of 1994. Storm of the century. 14 inches of snow on my balcony, and I lived in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. I let Gremlin out onto the balcony to experience snow. I watched him for over 45 minutes as he experimented and played and just generally acted cute.
Gremlin tried to steal the turkey out of Yvonne's sandwich. We had gone to my apartment for lunch. We had Subway. Gremlin jumped up on the table and investigated. Knowing I wouldn't give him the time of day, he directed his attention to Yvonne. First he got very, very close to her sandwich, inching so slowly that you couldn't see him move. Finally, he touched his nose the bread. Yvonne picks up the sandwich and leans back from the table. He takes this as an invitation, stands up and walks across her plate and starts sniffing the end of her sandwich. She turns sideways. Gremlin puts his front feet on Yvonne's chest and streeeeeetches out to get the sandwich...which is when I picked him up and tossed him unceremoniously onto the floor. I have remarkably tolerant friends.
Pretty much any party or gathering of any type at my first house was punctuated by having Gremlin jump up onto the table while everyone was eating. He'd try to find someone who wasn't paying close attention and steal something off their plate. Preferably a chunk of turkey the size of his head.
The time he duped my friend into giving him more food. I was going out of town for a full week, and I knew I couldn't just leave the cats by themselves, nor did I want to board them because they hated the vet so much. So I asked my friend JP to look in on them and make sure they were okay, but they had plenty of water, plenty of litter, and an endless supply of dry food. JP comes over the first day. Gremlin meets him at the door, gets petted, JP checks the food, water, etc. Leaves. JP comes the second day. Gremlin meets him at the door, but seems agitated. He runs into the laundry room, and JP follows. When JP enters the room, Gremlin is atop the dryer pawing at the cabinet door above the dryer. JP, curiously, opens the cabinet door. Inside are cans of Fancy Feast cat food. JP thinks, "Oh, Gary must have forgotten to tell me," and proceeds to give Gremlin a cat of cat food. He gets another on the third day, fourth day, and fifth day. At which point I come home. Gremlin's sitting on the dining room table, washing one paw, looking awfully smug about something. Later, when JP told me this story, I laughed and said, "You've been had. He tricked you. I don't normally give them cans unless it's a 'special occasion' or as a treat." Gremlin not only knew where I kept the food, but managed to make JP understand. And maybe he also knew JP is an easy mark. :) "What's that? Billy is trapped in the well?"
And of course, the general memories. Being at the computer and knowing that Gremlin was in the room, somewhere. In my lap, on the keyboard, or lying near my feet asleep. He tried so hard to always be near me. He'd even go against millions of years of nocturnal instincts to be awake whenever I was. Every time I'd sit in the recliner, he'd be there, in my lap, purring and making me pet him. Lying on the bed at night, especially in the winter, and feeling a little lump on the bed that I knew was him, keeping warm on the electric blanket or just making sure he was near me.
Oh, God, I'm going to miss him so much. All the good times I related here plus many, many others keep flooding back, and I smile as I remember, then I hurt because I know I'll never hold him again. So I'll say goodbye to him, here.
Goodbye, buddy. I'm so sorry I wasn't there at the end, but you know I loved you and I know you loved me. I'll miss you for the rest of my life, and I doubt any pet will ever hold as special a place in my heart as you. Thanks. For everything.
[And thanks to my excellent friend![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
craftsman for taking charge and driving me to the vet to talk to them in person. It meant a lot to me.]
What hurts so much is that he went alone.
Maybe it'll help me to type the technical explanation. Or maybe not. But here it is.
Gremlin had a heart murmur. Dr. Ricky first told me about it 4 years ago when we moved to Atlanta. It was mild and he said that it eventually would cause problems, but not for years. Then, Gremlin developed hyperthyroidism, which basically means that his metabolism sped up too much. His heart pumped faster, his blood flowed faster, his kidneys worked faster, etc. But since the heart was damaged, the faster metabolism caused it to age faster than it would otherwise have done. The increased blood flow caused by the hyperthyroidism actually caused the murmur to go away.
Then we started medicating him for the thyroid problem and the blood flow got back to normal...and the heart problem came back with a vengeance.
Dr. Ricky thinks that Gremlin's poor heart just finally couldn't take any more, and that's why he was panting and sitting oddly and not eating. He just wasn't feeling 'right.'
I guess it did help to type that because, as Dr. Ricky said, at least I know it wasn't something I did--in fact, we were just trying to help him.
But now I have my memories. [Note: This is mostly therapeutic for me. Now would be the time to skip if you want to avoid a lot of maudlin stuff.]
Tiny little newborn kitten with his eyes and ears pinched tightly shut hissing and spitting as only a kitten can....
4-week old kitten boldly going out of the box where he and his mother and three siblings lived and looking around completely unafraid. Spokeskitten of the entire litter.
The look of relief on a tiny, furry face as the flea medicine started to work and the dozens of fleas infesting his tiny body started to die or leave.
The look on Stacy's face (Stacy was my next-door-neighbor who took Gremlin's mother and all four kittens in just after they were born) when she told me she needed a home for the last kitten, because the guy she'd lined up fell through, and how I said yes mostly because she asked me.
The feel of that tiny little guy in my hand. His whole body fit in my hand.
Him lying flat on his back asleep in my lap, all four pink paws up, in an attitude of complete trust, occasionally kneading the air or making little sucking noises as he "dreamed."
Waking up to find a kitten nursing on my earlobe, kneading my face with his little paws, and purring as he 'nursed.'
Playing 'elevator.' He was so young, and he didn't know he was a cat and could climb and jump, so he'd crawl up onto my shoe and I'd raise my leg parellel to the floor with him balanced on my shoe and he'd walk up my leg to get into my lap.
How he stayed within 3 feet of me at all times for the first few weeks of our lives together.
How he made his 'first kill.'My mother and her friend Peggy were at my apartment visiting and we all had sandwiches from Subway. Peggy had a 6-inch Turkey sandwich. I had my back turned working on the computer while Peggy and my mother ate and watched TV. Next thing I know, I hear Peggy exclaiming, and I turned around in time to see Gremlin with the entirety of the meat (turkey) of Peggy's sandwich in his mouth, dragging it across the floor with it between his front legs like a leopard with a dead antelope. I accused Peggy of having given it to him, saying, "I was trying to keep him from getting used to people food!" Peggy said, "He TOOK my SANDWICH! Just crawled up here, grabbed the end, tugged until all the meat came out, growled, and ran off with it! Don't accuse me of giving him anything!" He always loved turkey from that day.
The first time he visited my mother's house and realized that he was a cat. My mother has a cat, Babes, who is a little older than Gremlin. She was a feral rescue. Gremlin was about 4 months old. Gangly and teenaged. He was utterly fascinated by Babes. He followed her around everywhere she went. She'd hiss at him and he'd just look at her. She'd slap him and he'd just lie on the floor and look at her. Finally, she jumped up on the counter to get away. I could see it in his eyes. "Whoa. I wish I could do that! Wait a second. She's a cat...I'm a cat...she jumped up there...which means...*leap* He walked around on counters and tables and such from that day forward.
The night he saw "another cat" in the dark sliding glass door and attacked his own reflection.
The day he leaped off the balcony. I put him on my second-floor balcony because he loved the fresh air, but I didn't want him "outside." It never entered my head that the stupid cat would jump off, but he did. When I realized he wasn't on the balcony, I panicked and ran downstairs...to find him calmly and with fascination sniffing the grass (a new sensation!).
Gremlin's first Christmas. I decided to put up a Christmas tree. I got a real tree, put it in the holder, added water, then got out the decorations I had bought and laboriously and meticulously hung them all on the tree. Gremlin was watching, quietly and intently, from nearby the entire time. I finished the tree and went into the kitchen for something. I was gone...MAYBE one minute. I hear a crash. I go back into the living room where I find Gremlin rummaging around in the now-horizontal tree, playing with the ornaments. There are pine droppings and water all over the carpet. But it was a great adventure for him. He "undecorated" the tree a time or two more before he lost interest. But in all the time I had him, we could never wrap presents with bows. Bows were just too much of a temptation for a frisky cat. And the bottom 2 feet or so of the tree (Gremlin was a LONG cat) always had to stay undecorated.
"Gremlin's Big Adventure." I came home from work one day to find him missing. He ALWAYS sat in the window waiting for me to come home, then met me at the door. But not this day. He wasn't ANYWHERE in the apartment. I panicked and ran outside and started calling for him. Right about this time, Peggy and my mother drove up and saw how upset I was. My mother took me in while Peggy called for Gremlin. He came immediately. He was COVERED in red clay and grease, and had apparently spent most of the day rooting around in the kudzu. He didn't want out for months after that.
How he taught me to fetch. He had a rabbit's foot as a toy. He carried it around everywhere, tossing it, batting it around...it was slimy and disgusting. But he loved it. One day, I was sitting in the living room watching TV. I had my shoes off. Gremlin was nearby, playing with his disgusting toy. Suddenly, I look down, and he has put the thing into my shoe and is rooting around trying to get it out. Disgusted, I reach down and pull it out and toss it away. He brings it back. Puts it in my shoe. I throw it. He brings it back. I guess we taught each other. He did this for a few years, until he was 6 or 7 years old. One time (and only once), I was telling someone about how he could fetch and they didn't believe me. So, jokingly, I said, "Gremlin, go get your rabbit's foot!" and he ran out of the room like a shot. A few seconds later, he came back, with the foot in his mouth, and he dropped it onto my foot. The expression on my friend's face was worth Gremlin never doing it again.
Gremlin's nervous tic. Gremlin liked to destroy furniture. One day, I had just bought a water pistol to use to 'discourage' this behavior. I filled it up and put it next to my chair. Later, Gremlin comes in and goes up to the new couch, flexes his paws, puts his freshly extracted claws on the couch. I carefully picked up the water pistol. I aimed...and JUST as I fired, he must have seen something out of the corner of his eye, because he turned his head to look at me. And the cold stream of water hit him SQUARELY in his left eye. From then on, all you had to do was show him a gun-shaped anything and his left eye would start to twitch.
Gremlin's first dog. My friend Phil wanted to see if I could keep his dog Max while they were on vacation. I didn't know. Gremlin had never seen a dog. So Phil brought Max over. It...didn't go well. Max was a bouncy-bouncy poodle who wanted nothing more than to play with Gremlin. Gremlin, however, thought Max was a creature from another world. He leaped onto my glass-top dining room table, fluffed his tail out to full fluff, raised all the fur along the ridge of his backbone, and began to make growling sounds and hissing. Max, of course, thought this was fun, so he started to bark. Poor Gremlin.
How he loved to sit and look out my glass doors at the birds, chipmunks and squirrels. He always made little "coughing" or "chittering" noises at them. Later, my mother's friend Anne gave me a 6-hour video tape of birds, fish, bugs, rats, squirrels, etc. made just for cats. Gremlin loved the birds and rats and squirrels. He'd look behind the TV when one ran off the side of the screen.
The day he slapped my friend JP right in the face (JP forgave him because he WAS invading Gremlin's personal comfort zone).
Gremlin playing in the only snow he ever saw. Blizzard of 1994. Storm of the century. 14 inches of snow on my balcony, and I lived in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. I let Gremlin out onto the balcony to experience snow. I watched him for over 45 minutes as he experimented and played and just generally acted cute.
Gremlin tried to steal the turkey out of Yvonne's sandwich. We had gone to my apartment for lunch. We had Subway. Gremlin jumped up on the table and investigated. Knowing I wouldn't give him the time of day, he directed his attention to Yvonne. First he got very, very close to her sandwich, inching so slowly that you couldn't see him move. Finally, he touched his nose the bread. Yvonne picks up the sandwich and leans back from the table. He takes this as an invitation, stands up and walks across her plate and starts sniffing the end of her sandwich. She turns sideways. Gremlin puts his front feet on Yvonne's chest and streeeeeetches out to get the sandwich...which is when I picked him up and tossed him unceremoniously onto the floor. I have remarkably tolerant friends.
Pretty much any party or gathering of any type at my first house was punctuated by having Gremlin jump up onto the table while everyone was eating. He'd try to find someone who wasn't paying close attention and steal something off their plate. Preferably a chunk of turkey the size of his head.
The time he duped my friend into giving him more food. I was going out of town for a full week, and I knew I couldn't just leave the cats by themselves, nor did I want to board them because they hated the vet so much. So I asked my friend JP to look in on them and make sure they were okay, but they had plenty of water, plenty of litter, and an endless supply of dry food. JP comes over the first day. Gremlin meets him at the door, gets petted, JP checks the food, water, etc. Leaves. JP comes the second day. Gremlin meets him at the door, but seems agitated. He runs into the laundry room, and JP follows. When JP enters the room, Gremlin is atop the dryer pawing at the cabinet door above the dryer. JP, curiously, opens the cabinet door. Inside are cans of Fancy Feast cat food. JP thinks, "Oh, Gary must have forgotten to tell me," and proceeds to give Gremlin a cat of cat food. He gets another on the third day, fourth day, and fifth day. At which point I come home. Gremlin's sitting on the dining room table, washing one paw, looking awfully smug about something. Later, when JP told me this story, I laughed and said, "You've been had. He tricked you. I don't normally give them cans unless it's a 'special occasion' or as a treat." Gremlin not only knew where I kept the food, but managed to make JP understand. And maybe he also knew JP is an easy mark. :) "What's that? Billy is trapped in the well?"
And of course, the general memories. Being at the computer and knowing that Gremlin was in the room, somewhere. In my lap, on the keyboard, or lying near my feet asleep. He tried so hard to always be near me. He'd even go against millions of years of nocturnal instincts to be awake whenever I was. Every time I'd sit in the recliner, he'd be there, in my lap, purring and making me pet him. Lying on the bed at night, especially in the winter, and feeling a little lump on the bed that I knew was him, keeping warm on the electric blanket or just making sure he was near me.
Oh, God, I'm going to miss him so much. All the good times I related here plus many, many others keep flooding back, and I smile as I remember, then I hurt because I know I'll never hold him again. So I'll say goodbye to him, here.
Goodbye, buddy. I'm so sorry I wasn't there at the end, but you know I loved you and I know you loved me. I'll miss you for the rest of my life, and I doubt any pet will ever hold as special a place in my heart as you. Thanks. For everything.
[And thanks to my excellent friend
craftsman for taking charge and driving me to the vet to talk to them in person. It meant a lot to me.]Tags:
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I'm so sorry, Kaa!
:(
All cats go to heaven, don't they?
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*hugs*
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he sounds like a very special cat
::hugs from all of us::
That's what friends are for.
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**hugs**
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-kami
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Hang on to those memories. *hug*
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:(
Let me know if there's anything I can do.
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*hugs*
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They fill our lives with laughter and beauty
Awkwardness and grace, frustration and comfort
A rub, a purr, a tiny snore
Until the mortal body can no longer hold them
And they must go
Join their royal ancestors
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Re: I'm so sorry, Kaa!
Re: All cats go to heaven, don't they?
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Re: That's what friends are for.
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And while you're at it, do it for the two-legged variety as well.
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Re: **hugs**
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I was so blue when I read your entry.
*hugs*
Re: :(
And if there's any justice, those big fields will also contain some nice, fuzzy cushions to nap on and a bunch of treats that he can eat any time he wants, since they can't make him sick, now.
It's a nice thought.
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When a pet dies, it's easy to think, "It's not worth the pain." But then you think of all the joy they bring, and you realize it is worth it.
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