Yes, Troubles do come in 3's

I recently posted that we had 2 "troubles" days apart... First was the septic system, and the 2nd was the water heater quitting.

Yesterday was the 3rd. I found my beloved cat Alice dead in the bushes just across the bridge. She loved to hunt at night and the last several nights have been warm for this time of the year, so I wasn't worried when she didn't come in for the night 2 nights ago. When she didn't come for breakfast nor supper yesterday, and didn't answer when I called, I started to really worry.

Yesterday morning I hunted all the cubbyholes around the property... all the sheds, under the house and in the barn. I even drove down to the Animal Control compound which is just 3-4 miles down the road. Nada.

My sister's dog sniffed Alice's body out early in the afternoon. It appears she may have been hit by a car in the night (they drive like fools on this country road) and was trying to get home when she gave out. I buried her out behind the barn in what has become the Pet Cemetery. My old fat cat Baz would have been buried there, except the creek waters rose and carried her away before I could retrieve her. (She was pretty decomposed and I had gone for gloves, a sack and a BIG shovel.) Four weeks ago we buried my sister's housecat in the new Pet Cemetery. He died of kidney failure, and now Alice will keep him company.

I had Alice exactly 1 year and 13 days; she was my birthday present last November. She spooked easily when she was a young kitten, and was growing out of it. Alice had become very affectionate, and talked to me all the time. 

My older cat Shug chose to stay inside the last 2 days, and hasn't eaten much, so I think she knows something has happened to Alice. Shug and Alice tolerated each other, but I wouldn't say they were friends. I love Shug, but nothing like I loved my Alice.

ps... I'll be out of pocket and able to approve comments until the morning of Nov. 21

Medicating my cat

The hazards to my thigh when putting flea meds between the shoulder blades of my older cat. I think forensics would find it easy to identify her!

(I'm still out of town, this was just a trivia post for the schedule... )

She was Old and Cranky, but I Loved Her

 July 2002

I was quietly having my morning coffee on the front porch one summer day of 1994, when I spotted this small gray striped kitten weaving in and out of the potted plants on the steps. She was starving, flea-ridden and skittish... but obviously looking for a home, or at least for food.

Once fed, she stayed... and I named her Baz for the main character in a book I was reading. The character later turned out to be a terror, and so did the kitten as she grew into a big, fat and cranky cat who never stopped being hungry.

Fearless Hunter

Baz and I lived in nine different places from 1995 until now, and she was always a willing companion, a guard cat, and 'fearless hunter' when she was younger. I never walked the garden without her trailing my every step.

I wish I could say she was a most intriguing cat, like Tom Jones in May Sarton's The Fur Person, but in truth she was a rather ordinary-cat kind of cat, with an obsession for food.

Playing 'possum while watching the squirrels

Baz loved to be warm, in front of the woodstove or sleeping on my feet at night. She loved to sit in the sun, and in winter as all cats do, she would follow the shafts of sunlight as they moved across the floor.

There are joys and tribulations inherent in sharing one's life with a cat. Baz would lie next to me on the couch and purr if I wasn't feeling well, and she made sure I was "safe" if I went in the bathroom. (I couldn't go alone!) She 'talked' to me, although mostly when she was hungry, but she was a 'Johnny One-Note'... and her one-note was strident. Her voice was the same whether she was being petted, or louder if you accidentally stepped on her tail, or when she was protesting the tardiness of dinner. 

She loved to sit outside on the warm walkway in summer, and always came in when called by name (especially at dinnertime) or for the night. Four days ago she didn't come when called for dinner, and that had never happened in all the 16+ years she lived with me. I haven't seen her since, and I know in my heart she is dead.

Several neighborhood cats (including the barn cat I inherited when I moved here) have disappeared recently, and the rabbit population seems down as well. There is talk of a predator in this very wooded rural area, and I am convinced something must have taken her.

She will be missed, strident tone and all, but most especially at dinnertime.

Update: I just found her body in the weeds close to the creek, under a low clump of trees. She has been mauled but not eaten. Judging by the matted area in an 8 foot diameter, I'd say she put up a good fight.