Mocha Java (August 13th 1999-August 13th 2015)

On the morning of his 16th birthday, we had to do the very last, kindest thing for our 'baby' boy.

I'm so glad I followed that impulse to open a can of birthday tuna the evening before, a day early. My one regret is that I didn't give him more. He had a good appetite even then. It was his last meal.

It's tempting to set down the painful chronicle of his last year or two, which revolved around managing the wild pendulum of his glucose levels, and trying to slow down his free-fall weight loss from what was thought to be intestinal lymphoma. Instead of describing that last awful morning and  trip to the vet I think I would rather remember all my favorite things about our second 'child' while he was with us.

---The way he would clumsily pounce on his own shadow when he was only seven weeks old.

---He would grab one of Tim's neckties or a potholder from the kitchen and run like hell with it in his mouth when he was less than a year old.

---His long black velvet ears

---The long tufts of fur between his toes that made his feet look vaguely like black stars. Which were also the reason why we had cat litter scattered to the farthest reaches of the house. The way he launched himself out of the litter box after concluding business contributed to that, too.

---His musical voice. He could hit and sustain the purest notes. I really think he liked to hear himself sing.

---His 'piano' noise. His galloping through the house frenzies were usually accompanied by what sounded like someone violently running the flat of their hand from the high to the low keys of a piano.

---Him 'helping' me make the bed. He would skitter and bronco-buck all over the fitted sheet, and not go away unless physically removed, so I would make the bed right over the top of him. And he was just fine with that.

---He liked to sleep in that bed. Every chance he got, and we didn't give him many of those. But the people who were giving him and his siblings away told us he already liked to sleep with their daughter at only a few weeks of age.

---The way he would jump up and sit next to me on my kitchen chair the last three or four years of his life. Until the day this summer when he looked at me with a face that said 'I can't'. Always on the left. He rarely if  ever would sit on my lap, but preferred to sit on the hard chair right next to me while I messed around on the computer. I could wrap both arms around him, and put my face on top of his head.

---The way he would rest his fuzzy black chin on my arm while he was sitting next to me.

---The way he would let us hold him like a baby. In fact, he's the reason I started calling all the cats 'Babies'.

---His thunderous purr.

---The way he would, instead of turning around to look at you if you were behind him, lift his head straight up and back so he was looking at you upside down.

---He was so good about insulin injections. He learned what the word 'medicine' meant, and would  saunter into the kitchen when I'd call him and tell him in that yodelly-sing-song way we only use around animals without shame that it was time for his medicine. We did the medicine thing twice a day for more than eight years. Weeks and weeks later there are still  significant voids in my day around 9 o'clock. Feeding and insulin, feeding and insulin... It defined our schedules. I had to talk myself into finally donating his remaining insulin and glucose meter. There's freedom now, but it doesn't bring me joy.

---All his other names: Marabou Meow. Baby Meow. Panther. Tweeter-Peeper-Puppy-Panther. Mr. Sugar ('Isn't that his problem?' Tim asked laconically). Plume Tail. Which morphed into Mr. Plume, Plumey and then Plumey-Plume. Or Plume E. Plume. All the silly names that just came out of nowhere.

Call it coincidences, or wishful thinking, or just Rainbow Bridge fluff, but there are some odd little things I take comfort from. I was carrying him out to the truck for that last ride, and I think he may have known why. There was barely any weight in the basket. The only good things left of his exhausted, emaciated body were his head and his tail. He was basically unresponsive  by then. But he looked right at my face and did a very sustained, slow blinky cat 'I love you' thing with his eyes. But then, it all might have been the morning sun in his face.

We have catbirds in the area all summer. We hear them all the time in the brush behind the house. What's not common at all is to see them using the bird bath. It's positioned outside the den window so I can easily watch it while I'm on the elliptical. The very next time I was slogging away on it, a catbird took a very long bath in it.

I find myself sharply missing him at random times. Tim and I were driving in the truck the Saturday before last, between braving the insane early fall crowds at Spicer's orchard to get some apples, and buying a snow blower from a coworker moving to Florida. Life, after all, is busily moving on in every direction.  I started thinking about him. About five seconds later, Ozzy Osbourne's 'See You on the Other Side' began playing on the radio.

I hope so, Plumey Plume. I hope so.