Gryffindor

Pet people get it. Pets are forever family. You adopt them and if you're lucky they give you all that they have to give. Dogs are super efficient at giving it all. Cats - it's just a roll of the dice. Most of the time you are there to serve their every need (immediately - if you have not been smart enough to actually anticipate what their current need might be) and for this service you are granted the opportunity to pet them on occasion.

Usual pose

Hey look - clean laundry!

The last picture of our Gryffy

We have been very, very lucky with our pets. Our cats especially. Yes, they have all been little divas but they have also allowed us to love them and cuddle with them whenever we desire. They have always been very vocal - after all, we still should anticipate their needs without them having to ask - but they have always been patient with us mere humans because we have the opposable thumbs and they don't.

Gryffindor was a special cat from the very beginning. He was a beautiful gray cat with mysterious goldish/greenish eyes. When we first got him he was so skinny but he had these huge ears and a really long tail. We thought he would never grow into those ears but he finally did...and then he just kept growing. He was a very hefty 20 pound cat. The vet wanted him to lose weight and I wanted to look like Angie Harmon. Neither thing happened. In fact, I probably had a better chance of looking like Angie Harmon than he did of losing weight. We tried getting a leash and collar to start taking him on walks. We are all happy to still have our opposable thumbs and other digits after that miserable experiment! We measured food, took it away if he didn't eat right away - we tried several things. He was just a fat cat. That's why when he lost 5 of his 20 pounds recently it was some cause for concern. He didn't act sick nor did he look sick.

Chillin' with Paul

Gryffy loved all of us but Paul was his person. He would greet Paul when he got home from work like most dogs greet their people. He would jump on the coffee table and follow Paul and meow at him until Paul would pet him. He would stand on his hind legs so he could get even closer to Paul. This was especially weird because Paul messed with him so much. He would pull his tail, pet him the wrong way (where his hair would stand straight up), and other bothersome things, but still, he would keep going back for more.

Yesterday Gryffy was very obviously sick. He was lethargic - which for a Latham house cat is saying a great deal. He would barely hold his head up to look at us when we went to check on him. He wouldn't even look up for Paul. We thought that we could take him to the vet first thing this morning but during the night he got worse. We had him under the blanket in between the two of us. He actually layed in Paul's arms with his head right under Paul's chin. His breathing was labored and he was obviously in distress so we took him to the emergency vet. Paul bundled him in a blanket and I held him on the way. He kept turning to try and look at Paul. I think he thought Paul could fix whatever problem he was having.  Upon seeing him the vet immediately told us that he was trying to die. His kidneys and liver were shutting down. She ran blood work to see if there was something they might be able to do. There wasn't.

When the time came Paul stood right in front of Gryffy so Paul's face was the last face he saw in this life. Paul felt it when his heart stopped beating.

Now we are faced with life after Gryffy. I walk past his food bowl and can't even bear to pick it up.

He leaves behind Clue - our other cat who has been through this once before with our cat Tabasco. Clue was a lot younger then. At this very moment he is roaming the house and meowing. Animals grieve. I know they do. This is going to sound so "out there" but I'm going to say it anyway. When we got home early this morning there was a big orange cat in our yard. We feed feral cats in our neighborhood but this was not one that I had ever seen before. This afternoon I saw 2 more that I have never seen and then 2 of our regulars. I know this isn't the case but it's like the neighborhood cats have come by to pay their respects to one of their own. Crazy - I know.

We will miss Gryffy so much in our lives. Even though he would climb on the table and try to drink our drinks and eat our food. Even though he and Clue would get in fights at 3:00 in the morning. Even though when he sat on you he had to knead you so much you would almost end up bruised. Even though he would sit on your freshly washed and folded clothes (especially if they were black.) Even after all of this and more - he will be missed.

He was family.


Gryffindor - January 2005-December 2013

Old Dog...New Tricks

So we’re finishing up an old year and getting ready for a new one. Really? Already? Man, 2013 flew by so fast. I think that every year, but this time I mean it. (I say that every year too.)

I don’t like to make “resolutions.” They never work out. Not through any fault of my own, mind you, but life gets in the way of those completely virtuous things that we intend to do…and once we order pizza on January 3 it’s all over. Of course there are things I intend to do – don’t get me wrong – but they won’t be published in a list to be laughed at later.

What I do like to do is take a look at the last year and remember the things that were new and different. They don’t have to be big things, or great things, but it’s important to try new things and as much as my inertia sometimes holds me back, I did do a few of those.

1)    Assisted with building Pinewood Derby cars. This would not have happened, except Art was in China during the key Pinewood activity weeks. Despite my complete lack of knowledge in this area, I was the assigned adult for helping my sons create their first-ever derby contenders. So we attended workshops, designed and sanded, painted and decorated. Admittedly, the cars weren’t all that fast. But they looked really nice! This next year I might even do one for myself...

 

2)    Rode a horse. Confession: I’m not crazy about riding anything. And I’ve ridden a horse before, just not recently. But this was a controlled ride, on a trail in an Arkansas state park, and everything went just fine once my horse was happy with his position in line. It was fun and the kids had a great time too.

Me on a horse with no name. He had one, I just can't remember it!

3)    Got braces on my teeth. I’d been considering this for a few years (just to get them straighter), but always put it off. And since I had braces in high school, it seemed like something I’d already gotten and so I wondered if it was silly to re-do. But when I had some problems with broken teeth due to an uneven bite, well, that was enough to get me to the orthodontist. I was able to do the Invisalign, and overall it’s been pretty easy – I’ve only got a few more months to go!

4)    Went camping. This one wasn’t my idea, and in fact it was something I’d been actively avoiding for quite some time. But when there’s a “family campout” with the scout pack, and clearly nothing else on the calendar for that weekend, it happens. Never mind the cold. Or the rain the first night. Or sleeping on a concrete pad. Or latrines – which, I’m told, are very nice latrines in spite of being more like built-in port-a-potties. There were also boys having lots of fun, s’mores, and some of what my kids call “PTV” time (parent talking virus) with the other scout adults. I'm not saying it will happen again, mind you, but I do have my own sleeping bag. 

5)    Conquered the Bundt cake. Not a big thing, you say? Following one failure after another (cake not coming neatly out of the pan, or occasionally not coming out at all) I made it my mission to slay the Bundt Beast. So now I’ve got a method, some foolproof recipes, and pans I like. AND some successful results under my belt – which is more important than it sounds! I have confidence…

This one is lemon, with hand-picked East Texas blueberries filling the center.

6)    Pinned. While the rest of you have been pinning madly on Pinterest, I had tried a couple of times (unsuccessfully) to understand it. At last, I took a little time to figure it out and – just like you told me – it’s easy. And kind of fun. But, like facebook and email and other cool apps, I can see how it might eat up hours and hours of time. So I’ll have to think about how it fits into all my other electronic clutter. I don’t do LinkedIn and I don’t do Twitter, so at least I’ve drawn a line someplace. But it’s a wiggly line at best.

7)    Agreed to get a dog. This one was for the kids, of course, but a big step for me. We hadn’t had a pet since about 2006, so we’d gotten comfortable with going wherever, spending the night away, vacations without worrying about where the dog would go, and cold nights when we just worried about the plants. It’s been an adjustment – especially for allergy-prone me since we’ve had so many cold nights when she’s had to sleep in her crate in the house. But she is a sweet, funny young dog who loves hugs. Once we can get her to play ball with us, and not just by herself (which she does when she thinks we aren’t looking) I'll let you know.

This is Frida. If you were here, she would certainly want a hug.

8)    Started a blog. That one had been coming for a while…not because I’ve got any mission to save the world or share my extensive knowledge of everything with my vast public, but because sometimes it’s just good to write. And doing so has cleared a bunch of stuff out of my head that was just floating around, waiting to get out. So that’s nice. Now there’s more room for reality TV in there (not!!). It’s also been fun to see what the rest of the blog team comes up with!

Certainly, I did more than this in 2013. But looking over this list at least I feel like the old dog can learn new tricks, all the time. Why, just last week I programmed a robot. Or is it a vacuum cleaner? (It’s both. I call him Jeeves.)