My Furry Baby's Gone

jenny-wren, donnac2558, thank you both so much. Very best wishes to your lovely furry ones; they are in the best hands if they own humans like you.

Very much appreciated, guys, thanks.

sheramber, Katiehound, CamelLady, thank you all so much for your kindness and understanding. You are making me cry again but it's therapeutic, right?

If the Rainbow Bridge (which is really beautiful, thank you) means what I think it means, I wish I believed in an afterlife, I really do. If there is such a bridge, I don't think it will be too long before I see Charlie and Lisa again. I just don't have the years to give to another young, healthy cat and can't bear the thought of taking on one I know I am going to lose sooner rather than later. I also don't think I would let myself love another one the way I loved those two and you can't stint on love.

Are we not privileged, though? It is a given that, if you fall in love, sooner or later your heart will be broken. Rather that than never to fall in love.

Thank you all for being so kind and for knowing how we feel, OH and I. He was vacuuming earlier, went to move the scratching post and fell apart. He said he could not get rid of it; I asked why he should have to so it is staying.

Katiehound, yes; we had Charlie and his sister, Lisa from new. We first saw them when they were days old: Tiny, little things with the tips of their ears still folded over, all a uniform pale grey in colour. You could not tell what they were going to look like. Charlie turned out to be a beautiful grey and white tabby with black stripes, a white bib, white mittens on his front paws and white gauntlets on his hind ones, with gingery, coppery bits around his face and a lovely spotted bengal sort of stripe down his white belly.

Lisa looked like no other cat I have ever seen until I saw a picture of snow chocolate-spotted Bengal. She was not one, she was a moggie but I think Daddy might have been a special breed. We have a picture of their Mom, Abby, sitting between a large, cream-and-caramel tabby and a large, black-and-white cat... The other two in the litter were black and white. Abby lived life to the full. We went to see them every other evening, must have driven Abby's humans nuts. We counted the days until they were eight weeks old, by which time they knew us so we carried them home in our arms (all of twenty-five yards on a very quiet, little street) I carried Charlie and OH, Lisa. She was a Daddy's girl, loved him to bits. Maybe it was a kind of impression, do you think? Like when geese hatch?

Lisa ruled the roost; she ganged up with this big, black, not-too-bright cat we already had, Montly, and bullied Charlie. He would retreat to the top of a wardrobe to sleep to get some peace from them. Lisa was too small and Montly too fat and lazy to jump that high. That was the only time he would walk away from a fight. He would take Montly on from the very start, although he towered over Charlie. Every year, Charlie ended up at the vet's because he had got into a scrap with another cat but he was lovely to humans.

When the carpet fitting guy came to measure up and failed to fuss Charlie quickly enough, Charlie used his leg as a scratching post to get his attention! The guy was very nice about it, being a dog and cat person himself.

I have probably sent you all to sleep by now so will stop but thank you all so much. It does help to remember the good times when you can talk about them. Thanks, you lovely people.

Thank you, pearl123.