Chelsea

... my cat of 21 years. That kind of life (I just typed love by mistake ... a slip?) gets a little kitty headstone. In a way, I could end right there.

... but those who knew Chelsea are belly-laughing. I was the only one she loved.

We were brand-new married and, like I've mentioned before, dirt poor. David was still in college and working nights as a chef's assistant at a nearby upscale (for Western PA) restaurant. I was writing environmental proposals for waste to energy and demographic reports for a local jail for my dad's company. We were blessed to have access to the house that David's parents owned on over 50 acres of beautiful land, waiting for their retirement from Middle East missions and return to the US. One day David's boss (the cook) and his wife asked us if we would take the kitten that they had just acquired. I can't remember their reason for wanting to cast her off, but of course red flags went up. We weren't home very much; vet bills were not in our budget. "But, Leslie," David said ... "she's had all her shots." All we had to do was buy her a little food. I don't remember saying yes, but all of a sudden, we had this adorable, beautifully marked and colored calico kitten. Her name was Susie. [DISCLAIMER: I have numerous dear friends named Susie. I love the name Susie. I love all these Susies.] That name had to go. It wasn't a cat name! She became Chelsea and the name suited her well.

She was a terrible mouser. One evening a mouse scampered right across the hearth right under her nose and she didn't twitch a whisker. But toss her a rabbit's foot, and that cat was all over it like prey, tossing it and pouncing on it (as if it were a mouse ...) We had hoped she would have some utility, as there was a huge field behind the house, teeming with mice. Not to be. She was, however, very entertaining with string and kitty treats. She had a painfully annoying habit of waking us up on Saturday mornings. She'd hop up on a dresser and systematically knock things over the edge -- one at a time -- until we got up. I don't remember if she wanted to be fed, or if she just wanted another "being" moving around the house, but this went on for YEARS. Aside from some scratching (our current furniture still shows the scars on a few corners), she was a good cat! She didn't get up onto the table or the counters. She didn't climb curtains. She didn't dig-up the plants. She did get up on the roof of the house sometimes, but always managed to get herself back down (we don't know how).

Chelsea didn't really like men. One day David called me at work asking me to leave immediately to come home to rescue him -- he was being cornered in the bedroom by the cat. Unbelievably, my boss didn't really question this (similar experience? one asks oneself) but when I got home, all peace had been restored. One time an old college friend stopped by our apartment to visit. Chelsea had "met" him a couple years before and hated him. How did she know!? We opened the door and she hissed and hissed at this guy! It was truly embarrassing. She peed in one friend's overnight bag (more embarrassing -- then we got her spayed) and she pretty much destroyed a new and precious pair of my brother-in-law's cowboy boots. But this cat sat on my lap and purred. She spent hours with me when I was working. She'd tell me when it was time to knock-off by getting up onto the computer keyboard and walking around. She'd walk on the upper or lower registers of the piano when I was playing. And she licked my tears when I wept. And there were days when I wept a lot.

She tolerated my daughter, probably knowing that if she hissed-at, batted-at, looked sideways-at that new baby, she'd be finding a new home. I really think she knew that. She actually sort of stood guard when we brought that alien home. Darn it if that cat didn't permit (with as little distain as she could emit) said baby girl to crawl on her -- to grab her -- to lay on her. Then they'd sit by the sliding glass door side-by-side watching butterflies or some unknown thing that caught their interest. Of course, sometimes she had just had enough and stalked away. I don't remember much about how she and the subsequent offspring related until well into elementary school. He had bunk beds and she assumed her spot in the upper bunk in the corner by the west window -- a nice sunny spot. Even when quite elderly, she could get up there and, later more like a load of bricks, make the trip down to the floor.

I was very concerned when we decided to get a dog. We'd moved to the country -- had some land -- our home was already equipped with an invisible fence -- and the kids wanted a dog, dang it! I pondered the response of the 15 year old matriarch and I was worried. When we brought poor Allie home -- ribs showing -- full of worms -- neglected and sad -- Chelsea gave her a little half-hearted hiss and simply went the other way. Allie didn't bark for months after we brought her home, so there was none of that loud, scary confrontational stuff between them. Allie basically ignored the cat, so all in all, the transition went smoothly. There were a couple times her nose got too close and felt the touch of that kitty paw, but also a couple times where I "caught" them sleeping together . That cat challenged Allie to dare to nudge her out of the center of the dog bed. Sometimes said dog would go find a different spot to lay down, but sometimes she took the chance to lay on down. I got a picture of it -- in disbelief.

As she aged, she continued to amaze the vets at her longevity. The old girl was smart -- taught herself how to get back inside through the doggie door. She'd come in and howl like a Siamese. I thought she was simply loudly protesting the fact that I had failed to let her back in, but I finally figured out that she really wasn't hearing well, perhaps not at all. A year or two later, her eyesight began to fade and her kidneys began to slowly shut down. She was still able to get up onto the bed (with the assistance of a lovely tapestry stool that I placed there for her) and snuggled and purred right up under my chin each night -- and was still eating (even her prescription low protein ucky stuff) so I continued to watch her. Her hips began to get a little lower and her once pristine coat was getting matted. I knew this troubled her greatly, so I groomed her instead. Her rapid decline just happened to occur around the time that David suffered a recurrence -- late 2008.

David had returned from a European Tour -- England and Sweden -- and had a really hard time kicking the jetlag. He would fall asleep anywhere. This wasn't so odd because he didn't sleep when the rest of us slept -- stayed up late; got up early -- napped whenever, but it was more marked. We were at a local play and he started snoring and I had a hard time rousing him. I walked him to the car and he lost a shoe. And when we discovered that he could not carry a tune, we got scared. It wasn't jetlag. It was, in fact, an 8mm cyst, forming off of new tumor, causing all sorts of problems. We had a choice: go home, pack and depart for Duke that evening or go across the street and be admitted to UVa for emergency surgery. We went to Duke. I think this was early November. I called a neighbor, who is also a member of our church, and they were more than happy to watch over our pets while we were gone. I couldn't think about the care that my cat might need -- I tried to explain her food, etc., but I just had to go. She was okay.

A few weeks later, David went back to Duke for additional surgery to prepare for nuclear medicine. He had been part of the clinical trial for this stuff back in 1997 and we attributed his survival to this treatment -- but it was more arduous now. He had daily injections and other medical preparations for the big administration day, so had to stay down in Durham for about 3 weeks. His mother was able to go down to stay with him so that I could stay home with the kids and get them to school and go about life with as much normalcy as possible. By this time, he was really isolating himself -- writing a LOT -- the surgery had caused some subtle changes to his emotions. He was very different and would not allow anyone to "take care" of him. I felt very helpless -- and more than a little bit rejected. Anyway, He finally received the treatment on Christmas Eve. A CNN camera crew was there to record it all -- to interview him -- to interview me . Then we got to go home.

Christmas morning was fine -- a little quiet; low key. The kids were a little gun-shy with him, understandably. But we were rejoicing that we were all together at home. Then the headache came on. A brain tumor headache. It's impossible to explain, horrible to witness, very fear-filling, and difficult to treat. We had meds and tried them. Then the nausea hit. These were the exact same symptoms that he had the day he went to the hospital by ambulance back in 1996 when he was first diagnosed. I knew there was something seriously wrong then; I knew there was something seriously wrong now. We went to the hospital -- on Christmas Day. After ten hours in the ER, he was finally admitted. The neuro-surgeons had no idea what was wrong; just a bad reaction to the nuclear medicine? Meningitis caused by all the injections into his brain? They just didn't know. They gave him a spinal, gave him an MRI, ran cultures -- five very long and very cranky days later, he was feeling okay. No Menigitis, no answers, but they released him. That night, my runcible cat could not stand on her own.

I held her through the evening, being careful not to jostle her or startle her in any way. It seemed as though my touch hurt her. I made a bed for her in a laundry basket -- lined with a garbage bag (she wasn't going to make it to the litter box) and very well-padded and soft. I hoped and prayed that she would die in the night. She didn't. My courageous daughter went with me to the vet, who prayed with us! and so gently helped us to relieve Chelsea's suffering. We buried her in the corner of our yard. David dug that hole. It was a sad day ... but I didn't really have a chance to grieve. There was so much other emotionally and mentally demanding stuff going on. But I felt that she deserved a memorial. She was amazing. I'm not a cat person! But she was MY cat and I loved her. I'm going to end here.