This is my story

My cat died yesterday.

Half-Patch was a calico, a small, delicate-looking girl. Notice I say delicate-looking, because like any cat, she was pretty tough. She was beautiful, mostly white, with strong black and tan patches. She got her name because her face was divided right in the middle, from just above the nose to between the ears, with a line as straight as if done by a ruler, black on one side and tan on the other.

She stole my heart when her eyes were barely open. She was born to one of the stray cats that used to hang around our property, born in our garage. Randi and I happened to be out by the garage when mama cat came out and laid down, followed by a litter of kittens who fell on her teats with vigor. Then, late and slow, a tiny calico stumbled out, mewing. Mama ignored her, and her litter mates wouldn't let her approach, so I picked her up, shoved the litter mates to get her some room, and put her on a teat. She set right to work sucking, and she was fine after that.

When she was weaned, I brought her into the house, and after that, she was mine and I was hers. She was demanding, as all cats are, but she had a wonderfully sweet, affectionate nature. She not only loved humans, she also loved the other cats, acting as a kind of mommy and keeping their ears clean. As she got older, she got floating things in one eye that left her almost blind on that side, but that never troubled her a bit.

I was blessed with her love for 18 years.

About two years ago, she developed thyroid problems. I gave her meds for it for a year, but she hated it, and she struggled madly every single time. Finally I gave up, figuring that I wasn't going to make her last year or so of life miserable. She did well until about a month ago, when she began using all kinds of creative places for litter pans (like strainers full of clean dishes). I put her in a pen then, which worked fine for her, because then she got to eat all the canned food she wanted without having to fight the two (much younger) boy-cats for it. A few days ago, however, she had a short seizure, and two days ago she stopped eating and drinking. She was tough - she didn't stop trying to eat and drink, she just couldn't get much down. I think her kidneys might have failed. Last night I came home and she was gone. Her slim little body had just worn itself out.

I buried her next to Ivan, right outside my bedroom window. I miss her so much. I especially miss having her trail me all around the kitchen at feeding time, meowing, trying to get me to hurry up and serve the canned food. I miss even more the way she would tilt her head against my fingers when I scratched under her chin. Yesterday on the way out to work in the morning, I stopped and scratched her chin, and she tilted her head strongly against my fingers. It was a proper good-bye, although I didn't know it. I'm glad I did that.