He was.

He was…

It’s like you sign a deal with the devil when you get a pet. You KNOW they are going to die before you, someday, (all fates willing) and that someday will come too damn soon. Pets give you that pure alloyed Unconditional Love that is their specialty for us, that oh-so valuable thing we need so much that we will say, "heh. "someday"" Some day, but not today" and we take home or welcome into our home that new member of our family, the one who will never give us anything but that Unconditional Love.

He was a good cat.

I met Riley Cat soon after I came back from Japan. I wanted my own cat but it was years before I got one of my own. Riley adopted me from the beginning, coming to me and rubbing on me and curling up next to me, all to the amazement of his biker owner – Riley Cat was famously aloof from almost everyone. He’d hear my voice and come purring, and he gave me a lot of that Unconditional Love too. I’d buy him treats or catnip sometimes, and my cats would smell him on me when I came home to them.

He had a good life.

He was always an Outdoor/Indoor cat, an unaltered Tomcat for part of his life, and a hunter of birds and gophers, whose bodies he’d bring to the back door for his humans to share. He was long and gray and sleek and was a lithe, handsome Tabby Cat. He was King Cat in the second place they lived and hunted in the woods behind his home in the days before the woods were developed into neighborhoods. The third place there on Johnson Creek was an island of The Country in the midst of developing SE, and in the prime of his life, he lived as any cat would love to, master of his domain and loved and valued by his Humans.

He was a Fortunate Cat.

He was all of seven pounds today when they weighed him. We have seen this coming; Riley has lost a lot of weight in the last year or so; two years ago they had to move from Johnson Creek to Oregon City, and while it still had a air of The Country to it, he was entering the declining years of his life and was content to stay on the porch, for the most part and to watch the world go by. I fed him and the dog when A was away and saw him at least a couple of times a week; he always purred for me. He didn’t complain; he just slowed down.

He was an excellent cat.

They fell asleep together on the couch last night, watching a movie and so spent the night together, two beings who had picked each other, and stayed with each other as long as one was alive. Riley Cat’s home was another apartment in the first place they met; I think cats adopt us as much as we adopt them. When A moved from that first place, Riley made sure he was part of the last load leaving. A had been feeding him and housing him at times; his human wasn’t his home anymore, and when he saw A leaving, he made sure they took him with them.

He was a smart cat.

He had wonderful balance and could move along the top half inch of the fence around the backyard like it was a mile wide. He was a graceful cat, a long gray steak at times through the house, and at others a slightly breathing gray pillow on the floor by the door in his bed. He had developed cataracts in the last few days and it was doubtful he could see very much. He was wasting away and slept even more than cats usually do, but today, in my friend’s arms, as we drove to the vet’s, he was more alive and aware than we had seen for a long time. He was calm in the car, nuzzling A as we drove down the freeway and looking at me and didn’t struggle as A left my car and they walked inside. As I was asked, I waited outside; I said my last goodbyes and gave him my last, heartfelt stroke, one of his favorite humans there, at the end of his life.

 He was.

*****