Yesterday was a hard day for us. After several bad weekends our sweet little cat Antigone had to be put down.
Two weekends ago she suffered from congestive heart failure; last weekend she was in kidney failure, we patched her up as best as one can patch up a 19 year old kitty and kept her comfortable, sort of. This week she looked so uncomfortable, listless, wheezing, fluid pouring from her sad eyes.
We knew but wanted to pretend otherwise.
David set an appointment with the veterinarian; in addition to her other complications, her lungs were infected. Completely treatable but to what end? If my dear Chihuahua Speck had such an infection he would be pumped full of antibiotics pronto; but poor Tiggy, what would we be accomplishing ? We made an ambivalent/determined decision and stuck with it until the final solution did its job. Even as that odious pink fluid flooded her little three pound body I wanted to scream for it to stop. But it didn’t and we chose the right path .
What had been her sick room, the little “Chinois” computer room is still littered with the detritus of her decline; David couldn’t bear to remove her presence so swiftly. I’m so pragmatic at times but what I wanted to do was preempt the sorrow of her loss. Her loss, the passage of all that we love is so inevitable, so common yet so fresh and harsh each and every time. Fate made her point in that one year ago yesterday, as we were putting down Antigone, we had put down our odd and sweet and grumpy daschund Buddy. Wishing them both a safe passage to whatever the hell happens next.
With pets dying, with Antigone particularly, they represents milestones in one’s own life. Like the good lesbians that we are, David and I adopted Antigone as a kitten only a few weeks after we met and a few weeks before renting a U-Haul moving van. That was over 18 nears ago , best decisions I have made.
She had been our companion on this adventure ever since and now she isn’t. New adventures, life to be lived as fully as possible await but last evening we toasted her with the best thing we had in the house, a 1999 bottle of Dom Perignon ( I wished it had been 1995 her birth year, but so it goes).
So to Tiggy and to Buddy and to Daisy and one day to one another; resolving to honor this light as well as I am able.
Be well, Lg
p.s. the figurine at the top of this post had been of four, lovely little things; upon first adopting the little monkey, Antigone quickly shattered its mate in her kittenish enthusiasm. I’m still sore over that.
Boondocks Babylon 