“Come back. Even as a shadow, even as a dream.”
Euripides
Grief is a strange thing. I lived with this cat for 5 years. I got her when she was old. Truth be told I lived with her for longer than that, and if you were to tally in the years of hanging around and partying at Club 22 I've known her for over 12 years it seems. I keep saying the same words to people.
“She was a special little being.”
Because she was. Truly. I talked to my friend Gaelen on the phone for over 3 hours the day after she died. We both knew how special she really was.
I made a vow to myself to try not to get too personal in these blawg posts. To shy away from revealing every minute detail of my inner world. And it is a vow I intend to keep. But I also understood on a deeper level the day I took Kitty in to be euthanized, that one of the only medicines for this ailment would be writing about it. It's one of the only tools I have to handle to grief. There are certain details I won't reveal. Some admittedly too strange and meaningful to be categorized as coincidence. But anyone who has spent any time whatsoever around Kitty, can understand the dance behind her eyes. The fire of her spirit. The depth of her character.
I wrote this piece a few years ago and submitted it to the Toronto Star short story contest. It was a short story about this cat I had growing up named Misty and the story featured Kitty as well. When I read it back I think the idea I brought in at the end of the story wasn't supported enough by the story itself, there wasn't enough meat on those bones to serve a steak. But anywho, I did reveal some stuff about Kitty in that story. About how a community of people looked after her for many years. About the rare time she was chased by a dog up into a tree and lost her claws on her back feet. About how the vet said they wouldn't grow back but they did. About how she would make other dogs 50 times her size cower in fear when she stood her ground on the street sidewalk. About how one night someone stuffed her into a cardboard box and flipped it upside down and left her in there for hours until my friend Gaelen found her. About how when I moved out of that brick and mortar circus tent in the annex, I looked deep into her eyes and told her I would take her with me, that I would come back for her.
Years ago I saw a friend of a friend perform at the Burdock. They were a duo from Nova Scotia and one of the songs performed was about a relationship this man had with a seal or something while he was working as a park ranger. Music has this weird way of channeling an energy, a way of sharing a secret publicly. I felt a moment of true kinship when he sang that song and explained in it's lyrics or pre-amble (the details get a bit hazy while feelings remain) that sometimes you cultivate a special relationship with a seal, or a dog, or a cat, or a river, or a mountain, or a tree. These relationships can even transcend human relationships in a way because the communication is so subtle or immediate. I thought about the feelings I had during that seal song for a long while. And for me, Kitty was that seal.
A woman asked me once if I felt like Kitty's, “Daddy”. I didn't really know how to respond tbh. I think I said something like, “If anything she's my elder. A spiritual teacher, a wise old soul.” But I definitely stated that I had a hard time categorizing the relationship. She was always just there for me. Some of the hardest and loneliest times of my life, she pushed her head underneath my blanket and curled up into my chest, her motor of purrs revving my heart strings into a symphony of unspoken love. I really believe that about her being a wise old soul. Some days I would look at her and ask her who she really was, what was really going on behind those eyes. And in her own way, she would answer. Her silence and stillness emanating mystery and an understanding of the importance of the question.
Kitty was in pretty rough shape when I decided what needed to be done. She had lost a lot of weight. She wasn't eating much at all and was breathing these big, laborious breaths. She would hide all day and find a spot away from everyone to lie on her side. I camped out in the living room to be with her her final night and even then she would shy away and hide under the couch or find somewhere else to be. It's like she needed to use all of her energy to breathe and stay alive. I think it was really hard for both us emotionally - beyond Kitty's obvious physical deterioration and agony. She always remained fiercely independent and incredibly resilient and I imagined her not wanting me to see her that way, and of course myself facing complete and utter heartbreak at the thought of her pain and suffering.
It was a weird morning. Kitty was more accepting of the carrier than usual. Everything felt kind of emotionally slippery. I was business like in my approach. I got a car for us and carried her in, and we made our way towards the Woodbine Animal Clinic. I looked out the window and noticed the crepuscular rays beaming through the clouds like hands reaching down to pull her up. It's funny using that word “crepuscular” because I learned it from a hockey podcast, but sometimes wisdom flows from strange fountains. I had this feeling of being a kid again in that car. I thought about seeing rays of sunshine pouring from the clouds like that when I was a kid, and thinking,
“That's God.”
It was such a simple idea to me then.
That of course those beams of light were showing themselves to help us understand the divine wisdom and interconnection of all things.
Seeing them poke through the grey clouds on that final morning just made sense in a way I almost can't even describe. That's when it started though. The gravity of the moment also came crashing down on me and the emotions flooded over me as I drowned in the love I felt for this special little being. Everyone is emotional during this time. I have nothing but good things to say about the staff at the Woodbine Animal Clinic, and although I am sometimes critical of business incentives polluting the care-space, I found nothing but compassionate understanding and an empathetic reverberation of heartbreak when I brought Kitty in.
It is getting harder to write now.
Death stops us.
We don't like to talk about it. We don't like to think about it. We for sure don't want to be around it. But it's something we all share. It's the one place we all go.
I held Kitty's head in my arms and we listened to “So Long, It's Been Good to Know Yuh (Dusty Old Dust)” by Woody Guthrie one last time together. There's something really important happening here. It reminds me of liminal space or the notes between the notes in music. You can't prolong the moment I think. She needed to die. I always told her to tell me that, when she was ready to go. It wasn't until a day or two before calling the vet that I realized that she was trying to tell me, the signs were subtle at first, but always there.
The vet (through thick streams of tears of her own) explained the process thoroughly to me that she would be put asleep, and that they would administer something to stop her heart while she was asleep, and that she wouldn't feel a thing. It's a weird thing death. It feels so final. Probably in the same way night fall felt in ancient prehistory.
Kitty slumped down to sleep and the vet administered the drug to stop her heart. I cried a lot. I think I was crying the whole time really. I remember saying to Gaelen when we talked the next day it almost feels like you went swimming when you cry that much. There's a body exhaustion and a sense of internal cleansing.
I'm in this room holding this dead cat. I'm crying holding her head still. I have this realization that she's gone. That she's not in the room with me anymore. I feel weird holding onto this dead thing, but also feel weird leaving it there and walking away. Almost like the longer I stay in that room, the weirder it will get. So I leave and I cry and I carry this empty cat carrier down Danforth crying. And the sun is shining and it's such a beautiful day. And the pain is so empty, it's a pain of lack, it's a pain of longing, it's a pain that I can only begin to understand.
To everyone that cared for Kitty over the years, who offered her love and affection, to everyone who understood her and helped me understand her, to everyone who has ever lost any significant being in their lives. I can't begin to understand your pain. But I understand it's inevitability, I understand it's permanence, and I understand it's gift.
Treasure every moment you have. Treasure your life and your love. Treasure each other. We all go.
While something stays.
Forever.
Metabolize
return to me in Shadow
in a song
or when I’m dreaming
a shift of pressure on my bed
or in some long lost hidden feeling
tickle of the heart strings
a hole inside the human
earth angel on my timeline
a soul to see the truth in
I’m not used to these new movements
learning dance of life
a student
visit me in memory
allow me to chance to view it
they say death is something putrid
and they’re not wrong or stupid
but how can something sickening
bring life into the union?
The decay is bringing youth in
destruction springs renew-ment
let the fungus take this heart
and change it’s constitution
…until we meet again.