I don't think he's coming back.

[Doreen Peri]

My Wink is gone. He got sick last night. Then he went outside. He hasn't been back. I don't think he's coming back. 13? 14? years with him. He'd been in my immediate family longer than anybody. How old is that in human years? 70? 80? I keep hearing scratches on the door. But it's not him. It's just the wind. My hope. Music in my head. My Wink is gone somewhere. I don't think he's coming back. He has always been the coolest cat in the crib. I miss him.

[stilltrucking]

sorry doreen
I feel like I could write a million words about cats. Some are exceptional. I can remember a gray cat of my grandmothers...
she always loved those gray cats with the white chests. She called the Matltese. She would carry her live chickens up to Jewtown to have them killed in a kosher manner. Then she would bring them back and I would help her pluck them. When she finished gutting them she would take the entrails and wrap them around the cat's neck. It seemed to have a good time with them.

[K&D]

carlos...named after Santana...we thought he left us and i loved him so much, even writting this brings tears to my eyes. i was at college and i thought he had run away which was weird becdfause he always followed me around the house and i thought how lonley he must have been.

know what happened, he got stuck under the house for a week, we found him and he has fully recovered.

my cats sometimes take vacations for up to three days, so give it a while.

[Doreen Peri]

Thank you both.

I made a flyer. Put his photo on it. Printed 30 or so. My daughter and her friend distributed them to the neighbors' doors.

It seems so quiet here. Not that he was ever a noisy cat. I just miss the "meee IN" and "MEEE out!" .... Maybe he'll be back.

He was so sick last night. I am angry at myself for not calling an emergency vet. He threw up. I thought it was something he ate. He was weak. His walk was labored.

Life is fragile.
Treasure each moment.

I watch the television. There are thousands of people who have lost their homes. Rescue efforts continue. Some are still stuck on rooftops awaiting helocopters. Mother nature can be cruel.

My 22-year-old cousin lost his life in a car accident just a month ago. Along with 2 other young men. Boom! Here one minute, gone the next. One day we had a family wedding. All dancing and kissing and flowers and glee. The next week, a funeral, the flowers decorating a casket instead of being carried by a bride.

How many died in the tsunami? How many lost their lives in Louisiana and Mississipi? How many in Iraq?

And I am grieving a missing cat.

Life is so very fragile. Treasure each moment. Speak of love. Offer respect. Now is all we have.

[judih]

life is strong and gutsy
and then life ends

that's how it is and it's all part of our cycle

those who believe in reincarnation, karma have their conviction that the energy continues and will come back to live again on earth.

Me? who knows. not dead enough yet to be able to say.

but someone said at deoxy.org that sex is life and less sex is more death.

if so, life is in our hands.

even floating on a house in New Orleans - we can live each moment till our moments are gone.

i'm sorry about Wink - but if it was time to exit, then Wink quite clearly knew the score. If not, Wink will come back in some form or other.

Cats are smart that way. i watched matchka trot off, never to return. But he's reappeared to me, here 5000 miles away several times.

we take it where we can.

[MrGuilty]

" I am inclined to the quantum mechanical view in this matter. My theory is that your cat is not lost, but that his waveform has temporarily collapsed and must be restored. "
Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency-DNA

[jimboloco]

here kitty kitty
i had a cat i recued from st charles avenue in new orleans
we had a pad in detroit near wayne state
real kool we had an outdoor balcony
it opened up into a courtyard also a tall tree
the third floor

one morning i found her dead at the bottom of the tree

i took her way up into the country
buried her in the middle of a vast green grassy field

painted a crying picture of the scene

my present cat sophie took off for a couple of days
came back, but we never let her out at all now


here kitty kitty

[mousey1]

Sorry to hear that Doreen and Lrod.

Don't give up on winky just yet tho....remember the nine lives rule!


It's all such a natural process for animals. It's just instinct for them to go off and be alone. Sometimes I think it's the best way. When man gets involved we often prolong their little lives in a manner that is not necessarily for the best. I tell ya I've sunk so much money into vet bills and meds and while they tend to live a lot longer it's pretty sad to watch them when they get old and decrepidy, suffer senility, lose their sight and control of their bodily fluids.....and if indeed Winky is gone take some comfort in the fact that he/she didn't have to suffer any of the indignities that old age can bring. The longer we can keep them with us is not necessarily the best for the pet. Best to go out when you still have some frisk left in ya. You gave Winky a good life and that's the main thing... it was a grand give and take relationship while it lasted.

Cat's are resilient. Winky may yet be back!



"Here kitty kitty."

Gawd!! What am I saying....I'm a mouse for Chrissakes!!!

[abcrystcats]

I'm so sorry about Wink, Doreen!

Cats don't know the concept "death," or if they do, they must understand it a lot better than we do, because they don't anticipate it with dread. Death is just passing into another phase of existence. If your Wink has died, then he is at peace. He's not suffering, he's just passed on to the next level.

I had a kitty in CA that I rescued from the pound, sight unseen. She was 13, and her owner just dropped her off, after keeping her safe at home for years. No explanation. I thought this was terrible and wanted her to live out her old age in peace, so I took her. I quickly discovered that she had a slow-growing, incurable cancer at the side of her mouth. No problem. We just maintained it, and I fed her lots of special soft diet towards the end. The thing is, although she was happier with me than she would have been at the pound, she was never completely "there." She spent most of her days looking out the window, and someone wondered if she was waiting for her "real" family to come and get her. She was never really with us and didn't try to establish her place in my cat-dom.

Well, when it was finally time to give her that last injection, to put her to sleep forever, she seemed completely prepared and ready to go. She was so tranquil. She almost offered her paw to the vet for the injection. Either she knew and was ready, or she didn't know at all. Either way, death didn't scare her the way it scares us. Animals are blessed with this acceptance.

Your Wink may still come back. It happens. But if it doesn't please know that he is safe and at peace.

I would keep looking for him, Doreen. Even if all you find is his body, you will at least know what happened and it will help you get some closure.

I know he was a much-loved and admired member of your family. He knows he was loved, too.

[stilltrucking]

abcrystcats

One of my sisters cats, I don't know what happened maybe a car or maybe a machete. Sitting on her door step with his head split open. (almost fighting back tears here) took it to the vet, all the time he is purring. I can't forget that. God I love cats. I wish I had the amygdala of a cat.

[jimboloco]

Our cat Sheba also had a growing tumor in the side of her mouth. abcrystcats

what you did was so good.

Animals bring out our compassion.

Now if only we would develope the same compassion for one another in this so-called nation of ours, America, and stop telling those exaggerated lies about the shit war on terror, is all interrelated,

i used to see the black kids across the street from LDBell High School in Hurst Texass, they got bussed to the regional colored school in Ft Worthless.

Now we got pseudo integration. when will that translate into political power?

But my cats are gonna get introduced to their cousin this weekend, Roxie the Rotweiller pup.

[WIREMAN]

My cat Chiefs getting better each day, after what the doc's feels was a poisoning, he disappeared for 3 days and came back dazed and weak....our dog Zaar's passing was a heartbreak back in june the only thing that cured my wife CJ's pain was getting the new puppy Zorba, now she's in bliss, he's been the cure all for sure.

[Doreen Peri]

the comments to this make tears come into my eyes because it's so clear to me that you all care so much and i'm just so upset about the katrina hurricane and all the people out there who i feel like are my brothers and sisters and i'm there with them somehow and i'm feeling guilty in a way for worrying about my cat wink but he was my family and i just so much appreciate you all being here for me and expressions of understanding but people are dying out there and i just feel so mad at myself for making a big deal out of losing my kitty ... loss is like that... we don't know quite where to turn and then when we do turn there, wherever it may be, we are flooded literally with human kindness and i don't know what to do with the bowl of catfood and the bowl of clear water and so i keep stumbling across it, my extra continents, my toes, my soles, my footsteps tripping when the door is still wide open and so we didn't know what else to do tonight in addition to grieving the dead and homeless, the cats out there waiting for rescue, other than to sing a cripple creek song.... thank you... all

[jimboloco]

ah, after out leafleting this morning at Gibbs HS, we did breakfast. What a raucus.

As I was leaving the joint, had to make a u-turn.....there was this carcass of asmall cat, still young, grey, the ribs and skeletal structuresculptured in shadows, the early morning light carressed it, alone there, stretched out on the divider, a concrete pyre for all to see, jimbo was there, and i marvelled with deep sadness and compassion.

I remember the last two animals I saw before that. One, a yellow bird, barely warm, perfect in form, dead on a sidewalk. I put it under a bush, a shrub, with leaves and sticks over the yellow angel bird body.

Alas not so long ago I saw a cat in the road early leaving for work. It was still alive, I dragged it over and placed it on the grass. A neighbor from across the street was out and said he'd call the spca or the humane society. Sweet blessings.

The grey sculptured kitty corpse on the concrete median
an imprint a sand mandala a whisp in the wind
lodged in my recollections now all perfect in its grey death repose.

[Arcadia]

I don´t know a thing about cat´s behaviour, I never have one. Dingo, the dog we had at my parent´s house used to leave and came no more than one day later with wild eyes, thirsthy, muddy and with junk smell. Then, my father had the difficult task to bath him.