On the evening of November 30th, Puddin’ ‘Meow’ McDonald, an 18 year old domestic longhair was struck by a hit and run driver and died instantly no more than 6’ from the sidewalk in front of my house.
Okay...so many of you are probably groaning about how I’m writing an obituary for my cat. Well, she was more than that. She will always be my baby, was my first, and was my companion for nine good years. She was always there to cheer me up after a hard day, always ready to lay beside me and sit on my lap as issue after issue of THE PODIUM was put together. She would sit with me in the living room, watch wrestling and snatch melted ice cream from a bowl. She would climb into bed between Joan and I and purr us to sleep. She would sleep upon my comic boxes and made certain she rubbed her scent on them, which was cool by me. It is something I’ll always remember.
All she ever asked for was to be fed and watered and loved. She got all that and more.
The story of how Puddin’ came into our lives is a strange and confusing one, so bear with me. Joan and I bought our house a few days after Memorial Day 1992 and within the month were moved in. Both my dad and father-in-law were under going medical treatments during that time so time spent on the house was a kind of pressure relieving one. During that time, a cute little gray cat began to appear on our deck, hanging around, sunning itself and occasionally peering inside the sliding glass door to see what was happening inside. Eventually it would let us approach her and eventually let us feed her. After much debate, the names Puddin’ and Precious came up and Puddin’ just stuck.
Finally, in the late part of summer, I decided that if Puddin’ was going to scrounge our food, she needed to come inside and visit. So I persuaded her to eat just inside the slider. She did and then started nosing about the place, eventually ending up under our bed. It was on this day that Puddin’ eventually came out and sat herself in Joan’s lap, for the first of countless times. And every day would be the same: Pud would come in to be fed, check the place out, stay for an hour or so and leave us.
Then, on one rainy night in September, she decided the weather was too rough to go back to wherever home was and slept under our dining room table.
She stayed with us until the night of November 30th, 2001. Funny: she came to us on a rainy night and left us the same way.
That first year Joan and I were together in the house were not the most joyful. Trying desperately to have a baby, dealing with personal tragedies in our families, she and I working many long and late days...we drifted apart very quickly. This usually meant her watching TV in the bedroom, me doing the same in the living room and Puddin’ making herself at home on my lap, where she was brushed and combed and warm. A far cry from where she was and what she had before. Over those winter months, she and I developed a bond which we shared until the day she passed on.
During the winter of 1995/1996, Joan found herself carrying a child and also found herself confined to bed in an effort to keep both alive. During those many weeks of nothing but bed rest, Joan and Pud bonded like mother and child, as the cat would hop into bed and on top of Joan, adding warmth and comfort to a bad physical situation getting worse.
And when we lost that child, it was Puddin’ who filled the gap. And continued to be our love, our life, our companion and our only child until Kayleigh came to us in February. That was an interesting adjustment for Pud, who always had the run of the house and our total attention no had to share with the little creature who was always chasing after her and trying to touch her. Kayleigh’s first word was “kitty”; probably due to the fact we were always yelling “don’t touch the kitty”.
Puddin’ walked her own walk and did what she pleased, so it was never a total shocker to find her on top of the sink trying to get at the chicken that was defrosting on the counter. And it was never a surprise to find her in the bathtub licking up whatever water may be drying there. And it certainly wasn’t unusual to find her lounging on top of the grill, catching the rays. Or waiting at my feet to be fed from whatever burger or steak would be there.
Or popping her head out of the back seat of Mike Keane’s car one night, as she decided to snooze in a new location. Pud was notorious for finding places to nap. Computer table, dining room table(both under and on top of), beds(both on top of and under), on the couch, in front of the couch, behind the couch. And every now and then, we had to make certain we hadn’t let her out because we would realize that we couldn’t find her, that she had found a new hiding place and it would take Joan and I 45 minutes to find her.
In recent years, Puddin had suffered through some serious medical situations, all of which we thought would take her from us sooner than she did. She was on medication to control an overactive thyroid which caused her to drop a ghastly amount of weight. She was on special food designed to keep her kidneys from failing. She had encountered a real nasty virus in the earlier summer which I thought certain would claim her, but she fought her way back from that. By the start of the fall, her hearing was pretty much non-existent, As of late, the arthritis in her back had gotten so bad that she couldn’t stand upright properly and on Thanksgiving Day, a day when she would always be sniffing around the kitchen, she spent most of it lying beneath out bed.
I knew it was only a matter of time...but I never dreamed it would be like it was; never imagined she would be killed in front of the house and I would spent part of my night in a hysterical rage cradling her on the front steps in the rain. As a writer I pride myself for not even dreaming up that scenario.
So now she’s gone, but not really. Her physical form is in the ground beneath the holly tree we planted the year after we got Pud. It catches a lot of sun and I can see it from the deck she used to sleep upon. While her physical is gone, her spiritual remains and I’m convinced her spirit is here in the house, watching over her “little sister” and every now and then I hear her scratching at the door or drinking water or using the litter box. I don’t dream them, I hear them. Really.
She’s always in my heart and I still suffer flashbacks from that night. And every time I hear a car race down the street, I break into sweats. Other strays have decided to roam the property and be fed in her place. It’ll be a long time before she is replaced, if ever.
You don’t just replace a child you’ve lost because you can. You keep on with life and savor the moments you shared.