Busy Week

This week was pretty damn busy by my usual standards, but I'm pleased with everything I was able to accomplish.  Here's a short list of everything I got done this week (that I can remember):

-got my Certificate of Eligibility
-purchased my plane ticket
-filed my visa application
-got a tetanus shot
-picked up my visa
-opened a new bank account that my mom can access in case of emergency
-reviewed AEON's pre-departure materials
-provided comments/corrections on the last AEON newsletter
-mailed a defective piece of equipment back to the manufacturer for repairs
-ripped every CD I own
-set up my new iPod
-gave my old iPod to my dad and set it up for him
-sold a few things on Amazon and eBay and shipped them

I'm sure I forgot a few things, but I sure am glad to have these things taken care of!

The Story of Maggie

We first met Maggie while socializing kittens for the San Francisco SPCA.  In her litter of four, she was the toughest, meanest, orneriest kitten we'd ever seen.  She hissed, scratched and bit so much that my mom had to handle her with leather gloves.  That all changed when her littermates passed away one by one, leaving her alone.  She underwent a dramatic personality shift, changing from a real spitfire to the sweetest, gentlest, most timid cat you’ve ever seen.  We took her back to the SPCA when her time with us was over, but we missed the poor cat so much that we went back the next day and adopted her ourselves.  We were so worried that someone else would adopt her first, but we brought her home and showered her with love.

Unlike her fellow adoptee Sydney, Maggie didn’t make much use of the scratching post.  She always had long, sharp claws that she had very poor control over.  She liked being a lap kitty at first, but after a few too many yelps of pain and sudden leaps to our feet, she gave up on that idea.  Even if we picked her up and placed her in a lap, she’d quickly move away, preferring her petting at a slight distance.  She also hated being picked up, clawing her way out of any hold as fast as she could.  She was terrified of strangers and was too timid to defend herself when Sydney or Bear, our previous dog, bullied her, but overall she was happy.

After Bear died, Jessica got a new dog, Penny.  Maggie was so scared of Penny that she fled downstairs, only coming back upstairs in the middle of the night while the dog slept in Jessica’s room.  The downstairs, and in particular my room, became her new home, and I became her primary caretaker.  She started to get more neurotic and desperately needy at this point, demanding constant attention and door privileges.  She scratched up my door pretty good in her efforts to claw her way in or out when I had to keep the door shut.  She eventually learned that there were certain hours of the night when I wouldn’t open the door, no matter what.  We had a lot of good times as well, of course, including marathon TV and petting sessions on the bed.  I’d pet her until she’d want out, then let her back in and start all over again.  She drove me crazy sometimes, but she was my beautiful kitty cat and I loved her.

Despite her age, Maggie never seemed like an old cat until this winter.  She began to want to get her attention by her food dish instead of on the bed, and would insist I pet her until she ate.  She would make the most awful noise when she ate dry food, making us worried that she was losing her teeth.  She was getting noticeably skinner, so we started to put down more wet food and even kitten crunchies.  She gobbled them up at first, but rapidly became very picky about what she would eat.  Duck, chicken and tuna were all no-goes, and she wouldn’t eat anything left out too long.  Sydney would push her out of the way and eat it all if given a chance, so we had to be the food police as well.  I almost never saw her sleep anymore, and she would sit in what looked like the most uncomfortable position for hours.

Finally acknowledging the obvious, we took Maggie to the vet two weeks ago to find out what was wrong.  The vet informed us that she had a mass in her stomach and had dropped from nine pounds to four since our previous visit.  Her eyes had become red and cloudy as well, possibly from lymphoma or kidney failure, and she likely only had a few months left to live.  We knew she was too old to treat her for such serious problems, so we decided to wait for the best time to end her pain and make her comfortable in the meantime.

We thought we would have until I left for Japan to say goodbye, but the problems kept coming.  She had good energy, but couldn’t get up to her favorite perch in my windowsill as easily.  With no adult dry food in her diet, she wasn’t getting enough fiber to keep her stool solid.  She turned my room and the garage into her personal litter box, and there was blood in her stool.  The final straw that broke our hearts was when she went all but blind last week, walking into walls and off ledges.  I desperately wanted more time with my poor timid, neurotic, half-starved kitty friend, but she had clearly reached the "more bad days than good" threshold.  Today we took her to vet for the last time and put her to sleep.  It was a tearful farewell, but she purred right up to the very end, and I'm sure she knew she had all the love we could give.

It's easy to see this as a list of Maggie's many problems and changes over the years, but it's more than that.  These pages are a memorial to my companion of 15 years, and a testament to my deep and unending love for the cat we affectionately called Maggles-Kitty.  Our pets not only provide us with unconditional love, they also teach us valuable lessons about love, life and loss.  We never know how much time any of us have on this world, and it's never as much as we think or hope for.  We love while we can and let go when we have to, and no matter what we believe, we all know how important it is to make our time here count.

Rest in peace, Maggie – we loved you so much while you were in our lives, and your memory will only fade when we do.

Feline in Decline

One of our cats, Maggie, has undergone a sharp decline in her health this winter.  We knew she was an old, but her problems were piling up so quickly that it was really startling.  We took her to the vet today and got the bad news we'd been dreading: she'd lost half her weight, and most likely has cancer in her right eye, abdomen and possibly on her nose.  My poor beautiful kitty cat may only have a few months to live at this rate.

I had been worried before that I would leave and never see her again, but now I'm thinking it might be better for her and me to put her to sleep before I go.  She's so dependent on me, and I hate the thought of her suffering in my room alone, wondering where I've gone.  I'm going to lose her either way, so I feel like I should take this opportunity to say goodbye while I still can.