RIP Mike Wyczowski -- Eulogy for a Kitty

This is Mike. She was my 7 month-old kitty that Monster found behind the shed at school in April. She was scrawny and skinny, but crawled into Monster's lap on the car ride home and fell asleep. Once at the house, I fed her, starvin-like-Marvin, and then she climbed up on the couch and slept for two days. She was home.

Mike talked. Well, she talked to me all the time. I'd walk in, she'd meow. I would call her, she could come. Just like a little dog.

She would sit on the counter when I was in the kitchen and watch me do whatever it was I was doing. Cooking, making tea, washing the dishes. Didn't matter. She'd stare at me. Just the same way she is in the picture. Just sit. And watch. Never smelled anything. Never wanted anything. She just wanted to be wherever I was.

I set up my ironing board in the dining room. I have a large plant stand in the front window that Mike would climb up to sit and watch me iron. (Which I did every day.)

At night, I would sit downstairs in my office and catch the news. Mike would sit at the top of the stairs behind the baby gate and wait for me.

I don't know what it was about her. We have another cat and three dogs, but I have never felt for them what I felt with this cat. Don't get me wrong, I love my animals. But Mike was my familiar. I loved her, she loved me. She slept on my feet every night.

Mike took sick about three weeks ago. Really sick. She got better. Then she got sick again. And never recovered. I had to put her down. This morning. About eleven o'clock. An hour ago as I write this. Her loss is still fresh in my heart.

I am bereft because I brought her to the vet (after my vet couldn't fit her in -- knowing she was so sick, and calling three other vets in the area) to see if he could help her. He tried, but she collapsed on the exam table. I had to put her down.

I walked around the house just now picking up her stuff and putting it in the laundry. Her binky, her towel, and her rug. I took all her pots of grass (she was an indoor cat) and put them in the garden. (I know she appreciated the fact that I would go out in the yard and dig up fresh grass for her every week. If you have indoor cats, you should do this too. Just make sure it's the right grass.)

Mike was suffering. It was the right thing to do.

I want to blame someone and unfortunately, the vet I brought her to the first time, I believe, misdiagnosed her. But that's something I won't get into here, because I'm just bitter and sad and heart-broken and I have no idea what to do now.

I will never be able to be in the kitchen again without seeing her soulful eyes staring at me, her contemplative gaze meeting mine, sharing something that no one can explain.

I love that cat. Loved that cat with my whole heart and soul.

And I know she was just a cat, but she was my cat, my little furry person who hung out with me all the time. Like my best friend. And now she's gone.

And I am very very sad.




Anne Gallagher (c) September 11, 2017