Back in 2007- on September 17 to be exact I found out my wonderful cat Wolfie had kidney failure- that he was terminal and that I was going to lose him.

So I  was given a choice- I could take him home and nurse him the best I could- which involved giving him fluids through an I.V. and tempting his appetite every single day ( for the most part ) because he just didn’t want to eat.

Or I could ‘let him go’.

It was an obvious  choice

I  brought him home.

I gave him fluids just about every other day. I found foods he would eat. I took him outside and sat with him in the front yard until he tried to get up to go back inside.

Sometimes he could make it on his own- and those were the good days. And sometime he needed my help with that too- and considered that a good day too because he was with me.

If it sounds like a lot of work- I guess it was. And it was worth it. I loved those days when I woke up and he was still there- when I came home and he was still there. So yes. My life revolved around my terminally ill cat. But it wasn’t a chore and I loved him so much- so it wasn’t like I was giving up much of anything. All the things I did for him seemed like such small things- I’d have gladly done more, given more but I didn’t get the chance.

He died a month later.

Before I lost Wolfie- years before- I brought Cerbie home so that he and Domino could have a little brother or sister to play with- Domino was a high energy puppy and she had grown up to be a high energy dog. Wolfie was getting older and on some days I could tell he got tired just watching Domino run around the yard.

So Luis and I heard about some puppies from our Vet’s assistant. She told us they were Retriver/Mastiff mix and they needed homes SOON- so Luis and I went to take a look.

Right we were just going to look at the puppies.

Cerbie was a sleeping in a puppy pile- and when Luis and I saw that mass of Pups all huddled together we didn’t know what to do- how do you choose just one? Well. All of the sudden these puppies started to roll around- it was like watching lava flowing out of a volcano- and up from the middle of the puppy pile this little face popped out.

That pup took one look at us and ran to the window- threw herself up at it and stood there wagging her little tail and ‘laughing’.

So, I guess you could say Cerbie chose us- and that day  we stopped at the Vets because a few days before Wolife had come home with a nasty scrape to the side of his head that had been caused by running into a tire- on a car- as it was moving. After that he made it his mission in life to pee on every car tire he walked by . He was a bit of a hard case I guess. Why he accepted pets or the moves we made as a family or the kids that were always visiting the house I’ll never know.

I guess he loved us in his own way.

I ran into the house and grabbed Wolfie and popped him into the dog crate with his new ‘baby sister’. I heard a little puppy growl. I heard Wolfie growl back and for the rest of the ride there was an ominus silence with an occasional thud that I thought was just one of the two or maybe both of them rolling around in the crate.

At the Vets I learned  Wolfie  weighed exactly one pound more than Cerbie. He was 10 pounds and she nine.  One day Cerbie would top out at 85 lbs and she was a big dog, but Wolfie was her big brother and all it would take was a twitch of his tail to send her running out of the room or he would walk up to her and sit there and they would do ‘guard dog duty’ at the fence together. When Wolfie and Cerbie were together she was all business dignified in a way.

Cat like almost.

It was last month that I lost Cerbie- it was unexpected, it was heartbreaking, it was on September 17-  five years to the day I found out I was going to lose Wolfgang.

It was later in the week when I finally let myself think about Wolfie and Cerbie – one leaving me on that day and five years before being told that other would be leaving me – I can see how it could be disturbing, it would be easy to think the Universe was really sticking it’s finger in my eye. But I didn’t look at it that way.

Wolfie brought Cerbie home- and when it was time for her to leave I think he was there to meet her- and it was right.

amm

:::Stories about Cerbie:::

I Walk A Little Slower Now

Cerbie

:::Wolfie’s Story:::

Where The Insanity Began