the sands of time running out

stripe really was an incredible cat not only did she manage to live into her early 20's but she did it while remaining healthy. she hasn't ever been sick a day in my memory (which i admit might be wrong..but i don't honestly ever remember her ever being ill or a worry.) and even tho she was a bit thin and frail at the very end...it was nothing like 20 yr olds tigger and bond. as i was stroking her when she was being put down, i was thinking...wow she looked good for such an ancient cat....her body was doing ok (except for the arthritis)...it was inside her head that the out of time bomb quit its reliable ticking and finally blew up.

and you get used to her always being up there...you get used to adding on another year to her age without really thinking about it all that much. without even thinking about it...you just assume she will always be there forever.

now i wish i had opened a can of tuna in the last couple of days so she would have gotten the juice that she liked so much.

i am glad tho that she died. i don't think she would have been happy living blind. and i am glad that she slipped into a coma during the night before i had to take her down to the vets the final time....she didn't like the first trip in, being awake and alert and taken out of the house had freaked her out....this last time she didn't care any more, in her head she was some place else.

i sit in an incongruent place as far as death goes...as a nurse and as a rescuer i am so used to death..it is almost comfortable. but there is a third part of me that is just simply carol...she is the one who lives with them as her family and keeps getting robbed when death steals them away.

i want stripe back up on the fridge..i want prudence back on my bed, i want larry too-tooting around and making me laugh, i want tyra stealing the cat food bowls off of the shelves, and i want spritely back running around in the fields....i want cole back, and bill back, and tula back and marilla and all of the others.

and here is the downside to senior and special needs animals..you are given this incredible gift of knowing and loving and sharing life with these amazing generous and larger than life spirits..and then poof...their time runs out and there is suddenly this empty spot in your life that they once filled with their warm, gentle light.