Posted on 01/07/2011 3:01:43 PM PST by nickcarraway
I can still picture the morning I was sitting with a dozen mewing kittens at the animal shelter in Brewster. There was a slight movement between two pillows on the far side of the cage. That's where I found Eddie. He was on his back trying to get some sleep "in this lousy joint," as I imagined an independent cat like him would say.
He was a plain gray tabby, as common as a housefly.
"He's the one," I said to my husband, Bob.
Eddie swaggered to the food bowl, pushing four kittens out of the way.
"He's so ratty," Bob said, picking him up. "And he only has one whisker."
Eddie tenderly pressed his face against mine. Then he put his sharp baby teeth around my gold earring and yanked with the strength of a sumo wrestler.
Eddie had chutzpah and he knew how to use it.
That first night home, he was restless. I calmed him with a song from the musical "Oliver!" I sang it softly, as a slow ballad, "Food, glorious food, hot sausage and mustard." He closed his eyes and purred. From then on, that song always soothed him.
Eddie got up before we did. I knew that from the sound of breaking glass.
We found him on the mantel where my Sydenstricker glass plate used to be. The floor was covered with glass shards. He quickly put his paw behind a blue china vase and chucked that off the mantel, too.
At first I felt bad. But that didn't last. Things are just things. Our pets are family.
While we were sleeping, Eddie bit our earlobes, toes and fingers. He preferred protruding parts. Imagine what poor Bob endured.
When we'd watch TV in bed, he'd scratch us for attention. Eventually I learned that there are times when family, friends or pets are more important than TV. And when are those times? Always.
Years ago, I was on the phone with a rabbi. He asked about my mother's interests for his sermon at her funeral. I said, "Mom loved painting and ..."
That's when Eddie came running in with something in his mouth. He had opened the new box of tampons I bought that morning. He started flinging the tampon in the air like it was a toy mouse.
I couldn't stop laughing. The rabbi assumed I was having a traumatic stress reaction and said, "When we lose a loved one, we're often not in control of our emotions and that's OK. It's fine to laugh."
That cracked me up even more. I managed to blurt out, "She made jewelry!" before seeing the tampon go flying across the room. Then I hung up — on a rabbi yet. Oy vay.
Eddie opened cabinets by putting his paws around the knobs. Vitamin bottles made great rattling noises upon crash landings.
We bought childproof magnets at the hardware store. Eddie simply tugged a little harder.
Back to the hardware store for hook-and-eye locks. Eddie flipped the hooks open with one paw.
Back to the hardware store for deadbolt locks. He easily slid those bolts to the side.
The guy at the hardware store already had combination locks on the counter.
Eddie came into my life when, because of an illness, I needed to learn a lot from him. And I did.
To Eddie, obstacles were challenges. When barriers thwarted him, he never quit trying. Words like "can't" and "hopeless" were only beliefs. Beliefs can be changed.
For the past two years, Eddie had been sick. I spent lots of time massaging his face — he always loved that. One afternoon, I used my fingers to comb through the lovely set of whiskers he'd eventually grown. That's when I discovered the side-effect from the medicine he was taking. As I gently rubbed along his face, his whiskers came off, all but one. I placed them in a tiny needlepoint purse my mother made for me.
He came into our lives with one whisker. And that is how he would leave.
Three months ago, on a quiet Sunday afternoon, I kissed his forehead and whispered, "I love you." He looked up at me. His face showed the love he was never successful at hiding.
As Bob softly sang, "Food, glorious food, hot sausage and mustard," Eddie took his last breath.
While his body was still warm, I cradled him in my arms and rocked him. I held his head so he was nestled against my neck. "Eddie, you will always be a part of me." I didn't want to let him go from my arms. But Bob, so lovingly and slowly, gently took him away.
And so, I honor the life of my wonderful cat who, from the beginning, stood apart from all the others. My beautiful cat, my Eddie, just a plain gray tabby, as common as a housefly.
Saralee Perel is a retired psychotherapist. Her column appears the first Friday of the month. You can reach her at 508-428-8676 or sperel@saraleeperel.com. Her website is www.saraleeperel.com.
You’re a jerk. Why f up a good thread d-bag?
Look at that face! Husband wonders why I am crying. Thank you for a great post. You so understood you Eddie and I’m glad I got to know him a bit.
His post made me laugh, yours didn't. I'm not sure why you felt the need to announce to the FReeper community that you hate cats, but you have, and for that, I thank you.
LSAggie (posting on hubby's account)
You will be gone soon. Look in to the mirror. People like you have no soul, or if it’s there has been sold to the highest bidder. Making fun of someone’s loss. Troll, disruptor, start working on your next screen name.
Whatever. People who actually live with cats are entitled not to agree. I have a feeling you can’t leave it at that; you’ll be moved to pull an athiest troll on a devout Christian thread act.
I don’t care about your idiotic justification for your previous posts moron.
Children do the same thing, do you hate kids too?
Yes, it is much better for you to spend your time learning the difference between "know" and "no".
Our rescue cat, Jackson Silver, loved our sick dog, Gypsy. Jackson showed so much respect to Gypsy, he worried over her and played with her, they were best buds. Jackson died of cardio myopathy two months ago, and Gypsy still stands in the backyard looking for him every time she goes out. We didn't see a sneaky, manipulative, snooty, untrainable cat, but an animal with empathy towards another. I'm sorry your life has been empty of such an experience.
True, you do express it. And it certainly is improving your status here, overall.
Proud we are of you and all your good works!
Continue on, good man. We all know you are correct and our compassion is just mere folly.
Woe be to us and our silly sentimentality.
“Obama is the most unsentimental man I’ve ever met,” – an anonymous presidential staffer. (P.S. Marx, Lenin and Stalin were unsentimental too.)
It appears you are in fine company....
thanks for that....you owe me for a box of tissues...cats are so special...all individuals...no two alike....
Kitty ping...
And won’t it be appropriate that a Viking Kitty takes him out?
(*grin*)
“I hate cats.”
Ha. Nope. You don’t, you clicked and gave yourself away. (You once had a really horrible cat named “Slasher” who kept you scarred all over from the baths your wife insisted you give him, and who was picky about what he ate, who slept on your bed and shoved you over to the side, lying in the crook of your leg and causing you to sweat something awful, who begged arrogantly at your table, who yowled petulantly when he wanted outside, who also yowled petulantly when he wanted to be let back inside at night and go to sleep on your lap in the easy chair, who was SPOILED so rotten everyone thought he was awful; but - you hate cats . . . yeah, sure ) Twinkie knows these things; you may deny it, but this is the REAL truth, CC.
Taken it upon myself to zot you? I don’t have that kind of power here. For hating cats? Grow up.
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