Bye bye Baby Jane.
You lived to nearly eighty*.
Now you've gone to sleep.
[*the calculation of 80 is according to a chart in the vet's office, converting nearly 16 human years to something helpful for owners to understand what a great long life she had]
Baby was always the first in a cardboard box -- and she came running at the sound of a plastic bag and entertained herself with them -- once taking it too far that time in the house in Harrisburg when she got it wrapped around her head and ran up and down the stairs of three stories trying to "escape" it (we did eventually catch her and remove it from her and calm her down). She wasn't necessarily the most vocal -- although there were exceptions. For instance, she was very fond of Demon, and would sit on his windowsill (he had an indoor dog house in the Logan Square apartment) and "talk" to him, saying who knows what. Plus, on the move from PA to Chicago, she made it known that, despite the tranquilizer that the vet had given her, she would much rather ride on top of the boxes in the van watching the countryside go by so we had to let her out of the carrier. And toward the end, she also really found her voice, but that was mostly about yelling at whomever was nearby that she was ready to eat (the medicine to increase her appetite no doubt helped with that).
I don't think she ever forgave us for not allowing her to be an only cat, and that may be the reason that she outlived almost every other pet, maybe out of spite (now only Murder remains, with all the others passing before her -- Demon in '08, Mystery in '10 and Mauler just a year ago [btw, can you guess that Baby is the only one I didn't name]). Besides adjusting to being in a one-pet household for the first time in over twenty years, it will also be hard to not have her in her spot on the couch in the evenings, occasionally watching TV intently like she was as invested in the program as we were.
Oh Baby -- you will be forever missed -- especially when I sing along to songs that have Baby in the title, when you'd always look up at me unsure as to why I was calling out your name -- but we will always have the memories (and these photos pulled off my cell phone tonight).
No comments:
Post a Comment