My Baby Kitty
OK, so I recognize that I haven't done this in a while, but Ravelry makes knitting content kind of passe' at this point and I needed to come and tell you about my weekend.
A couple of weeks ago, I lost my Baby Kitty. He wasn't really a baby anymore, he was 4, but he was my Baby.
Magnus / Little Rotten / or The Breakfast Terrorist (as he later came to be known) came to us from a breeder near Green Bay, Wisconsin, back on Easter weekend of 2004. DH's parents were in town, staying with us, to help us get through our First Communion and Confirmation before our wedding that fall. We had a big weekend ahead of us and two new kitten arrivals coming in to keep our older kitty company.
It was Friday when I drove from Chicago to Green Bay all by myself to pick up our newest bundle of furry love (the other one would be dropped off the following morning). We had officially named him Magnus, but really he was just Baby Kitty. The whole ride home in his little carrier he yelled at me. "Yeoooooow! Yeow!! Pay attention to me!!" Only when I stuck my fingers through the grate and he could rub his little tiny 3-month-old face on my fingers was he quiet.
It's about a 4 hour ride from Green Bay to Chicago, so we stopped for a little break about half way home. I pulled this big-mouthed, little ball of fur out of the crate and he immediately climbed my shoulder, snuggled under my hair and promptly started purring up a storm. He was so tiny that his butt was on my shoulder and his nose barely reached the back of my neck. While DH may have picked him out, I was completely smitten. Who wouldn't be?
My MIL laughed when she first saw him because she said he looked like some one stuck him in the dryer without a dryer sheet and set it on ""Fluff"!
Little Baby Kitty turned out to be the biggest lover we've ever known. He was my Bud, my Best Friend and my companion. He was just as important to DH. He would climb up on DH while he napped on the sofa and snuggle in for a nap right along with him.
Every night when I came home from work, he would run to the door and greet me. He followed me about the house and often served as a model accessory in my knitting photography simply because he went wherever I went. He rarely, if ever misbehaved, though he did have a propensity for biting off my working yarn about 4" from the WIP....
He had the tiniest of meows when he wanted to talk to you. Yes; he talked to us. He mewed and grunted his disapproval when we woke him from a nap to administer the requisite 400 smooches per day. He "Yeooowww-ed" each morning and evening when he decided it was time to eat and he even yelled at you if he wanted your attention when he felt you weren't giving him his due respect. All of that being said, he was a very quiet kitty. He didn't yowl at the windows or squall in the downstairs in the middle of the night. He used his voice judiciously and only when he wanted to tell you something important like: Dammnit! Feed me!
The first time I took him to the vet when he was a kitten, we were walking into the office as our vet was coming out. Our vet looked down into the crate and said "Well, Hello!" and a full lunged, very frank, "Yeoooowww!" was his response. Little Man was never afraid. When we went to the Vet he wanted to be on his own to walk around the room but would always come back to check in and snuggle in my arms for a moment between sweeps, just to be sure everything was as it should be. 
Magnus was a sock foot lover extraordinaire. If there was an unshod foot with a sock in it anywhere in the house, he would find it and make out with it. No matter if he'd never met you before; he loved feet in socks.
Lately, he'd taken to waking me up in the morning. The moment the sun started to come through the window he'd leap up onto our bed, march up my leg, across my butt, straight up my spine and start kneading bread dough on my back as I lay motionless trying to pretend The Breakfast Terrorist hadn't decided it was time for me to get up. If I pushed him off, he would march around my head on my pillow and sit in front of my face and STARE down into my eyes (which were squeezed tight) willing me to get up and feed him. It was at those moments that I loved him the most: his soft warm little body, patiently waiting in the early morning sunshine, willing me to get up and purring softly into my ear. If it was a really good morning, I would get a pink nose on the forehead and a soft little "Wow?" in my ear. Never obnoxious, just insistent.
Last November, DH came home one night to find our Baby Kitty dragging his beautiful little back legs up the stairs to say hello. He was immobile from the waist down. To avoid all the horrid details, we learned he had a clot that had broken free and was blocking the artery that fed his back legs. I refused to let my Sweetheart go. The Emergency Cardiologist vet gave him a bunch of medicine and took an EEG. We learned that even if he got a little better, our Baby Kitty had hardening of the heart walls and probably wouldn't live more than another 11 months. We would have to give him medicine every morning and every night. But he was my Lover Kitty. I wasn't prepared to just let him go.
Over the next 7 months, we cherished each and every day with him. He got tons better and each time we took him to the vet for a checkup, he would smile hugely and say "He looks like nothing ever happened. He's an amazing cat." I never failed to agree. He got his medicine every morning and every morning before I left for work I said "I love you Baby Kitty. You be a good boy today. You'd better be here when I get home..."
Then Saturday morning June 7th, I woke up at 5:50 am as I went to the restroom, I noticed that my Lover Boy was curled up in the hallway against the wall. I'd been worried about him since Thursday night when I came home and he didn't come to greet me. I picked him up and immediately heard his breathing had become shallow and quick. My heart broke at that very moment. I knew the hour glass had run out of sand.
DH and I gave him the emergency medicine they told us to give him when we noticed these exact developments and bundled him in the car and off to the Emergency Vet. Since it was 6:30 on a Saturday morning, they wanted to keep him until Monday and put him on oxygen and a bunch of other meds until the Cardiology Specialist would be back in. In my heart, I knew that we had reached the end and that there was no way on God's Green Earth that I was going to leave my Little Prince alone in the hospital by himself all weekend, just to put a bandaid on the inevitable.
DH and I talked and cried and agreed that it was time. We'd been blessed with an unexpected 7 extra months with Our Lover and we couldn't see making him suffer just so we didn't have to let go only to have to go through this again in a day, a week, a month....
I held my Darling Baby Kitty in my arms and DH rubbed his little white Bugs Bunny feet as the last breath of life left his precious body.
Sweet Baby Kitty, you will always have a special place in my heart. May Kitty Heaven have all the Chicken and Rice with Gravy you can eat and may chin scritches and sock feet abound.
All my love,
Mamma
Magnus
Jan 18th, 2004 - June 7th, 2008
A couple of weeks ago, I lost my Baby Kitty. He wasn't really a baby anymore, he was 4, but he was my Baby.
Magnus / Little Rotten / or The Breakfast Terrorist (as he later came to be known) came to us from a breeder near Green Bay, Wisconsin, back on Easter weekend of 2004. DH's parents were in town, staying with us, to help us get through our First Communion and Confirmation before our wedding that fall. We had a big weekend ahead of us and two new kitten arrivals coming in to keep our older kitty company.
It was Friday when I drove from Chicago to Green Bay all by myself to pick up our newest bundle of furry love (the other one would be dropped off the following morning). We had officially named him Magnus, but really he was just Baby Kitty. The whole ride home in his little carrier he yelled at me. "Yeoooooow! Yeow!! Pay attention to me!!" Only when I stuck my fingers through the grate and he could rub his little tiny 3-month-old face on my fingers was he quiet.
It's about a 4 hour ride from Green Bay to Chicago, so we stopped for a little break about half way home. I pulled this big-mouthed, little ball of fur out of the crate and he immediately climbed my shoulder, snuggled under my hair and promptly started purring up a storm. He was so tiny that his butt was on my shoulder and his nose barely reached the back of my neck. While DH may have picked him out, I was completely smitten. Who wouldn't be?
My MIL laughed when she first saw him because she said he looked like some one stuck him in the dryer without a dryer sheet and set it on ""Fluff"!
Little Baby Kitty turned out to be the biggest lover we've ever known. He was my Bud, my Best Friend and my companion. He was just as important to DH. He would climb up on DH while he napped on the sofa and snuggle in for a nap right along with him.
Every night when I came home from work, he would run to the door and greet me. He followed me about the house and often served as a model accessory in my knitting photography simply because he went wherever I went. He rarely, if ever misbehaved, though he did have a propensity for biting off my working yarn about 4" from the WIP....
He had the tiniest of meows when he wanted to talk to you. Yes; he talked to us. He mewed and grunted his disapproval when we woke him from a nap to administer the requisite 400 smooches per day. He "Yeooowww-ed" each morning and evening when he decided it was time to eat and he even yelled at you if he wanted your attention when he felt you weren't giving him his due respect. All of that being said, he was a very quiet kitty. He didn't yowl at the windows or squall in the downstairs in the middle of the night. He used his voice judiciously and only when he wanted to tell you something important like: Dammnit! Feed me!
The first time I took him to the vet when he was a kitten, we were walking into the office as our vet was coming out. Our vet looked down into the crate and said "Well, Hello!" and a full lunged, very frank, "Yeoooowww!" was his response. Little Man was never afraid. When we went to the Vet he wanted to be on his own to walk around the room but would always come back to check in and snuggle in my arms for a moment between sweeps, just to be sure everything was as it should be. Magnus was a sock foot lover extraordinaire. If there was an unshod foot with a sock in it anywhere in the house, he would find it and make out with it. No matter if he'd never met you before; he loved feet in socks.
Lately, he'd taken to waking me up in the morning. The moment the sun started to come through the window he'd leap up onto our bed, march up my leg, across my butt, straight up my spine and start kneading bread dough on my back as I lay motionless trying to pretend The Breakfast Terrorist hadn't decided it was time for me to get up. If I pushed him off, he would march around my head on my pillow and sit in front of my face and STARE down into my eyes (which were squeezed tight) willing me to get up and feed him. It was at those moments that I loved him the most: his soft warm little body, patiently waiting in the early morning sunshine, willing me to get up and purring softly into my ear. If it was a really good morning, I would get a pink nose on the forehead and a soft little "Wow?" in my ear. Never obnoxious, just insistent.
Last November, DH came home one night to find our Baby Kitty dragging his beautiful little back legs up the stairs to say hello. He was immobile from the waist down. To avoid all the horrid details, we learned he had a clot that had broken free and was blocking the artery that fed his back legs. I refused to let my Sweetheart go. The Emergency Cardiologist vet gave him a bunch of medicine and took an EEG. We learned that even if he got a little better, our Baby Kitty had hardening of the heart walls and probably wouldn't live more than another 11 months. We would have to give him medicine every morning and every night. But he was my Lover Kitty. I wasn't prepared to just let him go.
Over the next 7 months, we cherished each and every day with him. He got tons better and each time we took him to the vet for a checkup, he would smile hugely and say "He looks like nothing ever happened. He's an amazing cat." I never failed to agree. He got his medicine every morning and every morning before I left for work I said "I love you Baby Kitty. You be a good boy today. You'd better be here when I get home..."
Then Saturday morning June 7th, I woke up at 5:50 am as I went to the restroom, I noticed that my Lover Boy was curled up in the hallway against the wall. I'd been worried about him since Thursday night when I came home and he didn't come to greet me. I picked him up and immediately heard his breathing had become shallow and quick. My heart broke at that very moment. I knew the hour glass had run out of sand.
DH and I gave him the emergency medicine they told us to give him when we noticed these exact developments and bundled him in the car and off to the Emergency Vet. Since it was 6:30 on a Saturday morning, they wanted to keep him until Monday and put him on oxygen and a bunch of other meds until the Cardiology Specialist would be back in. In my heart, I knew that we had reached the end and that there was no way on God's Green Earth that I was going to leave my Little Prince alone in the hospital by himself all weekend, just to put a bandaid on the inevitable.DH and I talked and cried and agreed that it was time. We'd been blessed with an unexpected 7 extra months with Our Lover and we couldn't see making him suffer just so we didn't have to let go only to have to go through this again in a day, a week, a month....
I held my Darling Baby Kitty in my arms and DH rubbed his little white Bugs Bunny feet as the last breath of life left his precious body.
Sweet Baby Kitty, you will always have a special place in my heart. May Kitty Heaven have all the Chicken and Rice with Gravy you can eat and may chin scritches and sock feet abound.
All my love,
Mamma
Magnus
Jan 18th, 2004 - June 7th, 2008
posted by Chicago Jen at 2:48 PM
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