Tonight we had to put Mommy to sleep and it was much harder than I thought it would be. She’d been feeling a bit low for a couple weeks but I wasn’t sure what it was. Just sort of lethargic. I made an appt to take her to the vets tomorrow but when I came home from work tonight, her breathing was very labored so we took her to the Emergency Vets where they said she had some sort of congestive heart disease and even with all sorts of tests and meds, she was too far along and it would only give her a few months at best. I didn’t want her to be in pain so we made the decision to put her to sleep now. And damn, that was hard to do. Even Duty cried.

Mommy was a stray cat that I sort of adopted when I lived in Richmond. She used to go visiting all the people in the apartment complex and one night it was raining and so I let her in and she ended up staying. Always the first to the food bowl and with a happy chirp, Mommy was a really good cat. I called her “the General” because whenever I moved to some place new, I would take her first and let her check out the place ahead of the other cats. If it was okay with Mommy, it was okay with the others. She never gave me one ounce of trouble, had six sweet kittens and was a true “sophisticat”.

Mommy, I will see you on the other side, sweetie. I will fondly think of you running downstairs to go outside and sit in the sun. I hope there are lots of treats and comfy pillows for you to sit on where you are. I love ya.