On the death of a domestic cat

I worry mostly about the other cat, the big, dumb male who is partly blind and suffers from PTSD. He hated Pangaea, but she was the axis of his world, competing for the attention of Mom, for space on the couch, and for food in the kitchen. How will he know who he is, now that his Nemesis is gone?

I feel the absence of the caretaking I have done, these many years. Pangaea needed pills morning and night, and trips to the cancer vet every three weeks, and, toward the end, carrying down the stairs for sojourns in the sun. All that focus, all that time, is no longer assigned, devoted, occupied, and it leaves an emptiness.

I think one loves what one takes care of. Love does not arise out of nothing; it comes from a choice. A cat is a cat, a predator species that runs around in the world killing birds and rodents. There’s no reason for me to love a cat. I choose to love a cat.

While Pangaea was dying, we had a lot of help, and in that we are very fortunate. It’s expensive for a cat to die. We could afford the emergency vet who kept Pangaea comfortable overnight the night before she died. We could afford the veterinary oncologist who explained that her cancer had spread, and it really was the end of her life. And we could afford the home-visiting euthanasia-vet who helped Pangaea on her way without trauma and without pain.

I cringe in fear to think of all the people who do not have help, who must face pain and trauma and death on their own, without medications, without relief, without understanding. Every tiny joy of mine has a shadow somewhere, where there is no help for people who are suffering.

The absence created by death turns you to the other relationships in your life. This relatively small loss suddenly forces me to look at what remains. I’m the kind of guy who mediates his relationships through the woman in his life: her friends are my friends, and that’s pretty much all there is. What if she dies? What if she kicks me to the curb? WTF will I do then?

And of course the sudden presence of actual death in my life makes me think about the wave of death rising up above the whole world. It is possible to vanish. It is possible for things to be suddenly and irretrievably gone.

So the answer is: choose to love and do it today. Now is the chance we have to love. Cats, people, nature, funny little rituals on the computer. Whatever it is, choose it and do it.

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