be careful what you wish for
(hannah and me, part twenty-three)


for going on i can't remember how long, i've wished out loud to anyone that may visit the house or listen if it's on my mind for one thing. to be rid of the three cats that currently share our home with us. it's not as much that spud refuses to get his lazy ass up and get a job. or that softball won't clean the catpan. or that punkin absolutely will not do laundry even if i threaten to withhold food and water. it's not really any of that. it's the hair. the freaking cat hair. it's everywhere. and most folks that have heard me rant against the cats know that in the same breath that i wish for them to be gone, i will make it a point to say that it's not the cats that i loathe but the sitting down anywhere in the house (other than my and sarah's bedroom...the only cat hair-free zone) followed by getting up with a layer of fur attached. cats make good companions i suppose. they are fairly low maintenance. they eat, sleep and poop, but save for food and fresh litter, they are really no financial burden at all. with cats, even ours, outside of the hair there aren't many worries.

that is, until now.

punkin is sick. punkin is the oldest of our kitties. she's been with me for somewhere over ten years now. i can't really remember exactly how old she is, but i know she's lived in four different houses/apartments with me if i am counting correctly. we noticed over the last couple of weeks little drops of blood on the floor in the kitchen every couple of days and wondered if one of the cats had scratched themselves and were bleeding here and there. it wasn't 'til wednesday, that we found a key (and gross) piece of evidence along with blood on punkin's mouth that we knew something major may be wrong. we took punkin in to see the vet yesterday morning and received the news yesterday afternoon that she probably had kitty cancer. a lump in her mouth that it looks like will be confirmed as a cancerous tumor early next week. long story short, the prognosis isn't good. any procedure to remove the tumor (considering where it's located) could seriously alter her quality of life and even with (expensive) surgery followed by (even more expensive) kitty chemo, there is no guarantee that punkin would live much longer.

and so it's a sad day and will be a sad weekend at the o'kelley's as we contemplate what our plan will be for punkin's final days. i am most sad for hannah, though, for a couple reasons. one, the older she gets, the more attached she is getting to all her pets. and two, only in the last few months have she and punkin seemed to bond (notice the pictures of the two of them napping with spud on her website). she couldn't wait to pick her up from the doctor today and bring her home. at this point, i have zero idea how in the world we are going to tell her that punkin may not be living with us for much longer. i am glad i have sarah to help me with this. if it were up to me, i would just have to lie.

"daddy, where's punkin?"
"she left, sweetheart."
"she left? where did she go?"
"um. she left to go live with brian...in florida...at the beach. yeah, she went to the beach. like us."
"punkin went to the beach?"
"yep."
"is she coming back."
"..."
"when is punkin coming back, daddy?"
"you wanna go to mcdonald's?"

i don't know if working at a pet store has made me any more sympathetic to something like the loss of a pet. i've always appreciated how pleasant a pet around the house can be. but i also know, in the grand scheme of things, they are just a pet. a member of the family for sure. but i don't know how long i will actually grieve for punkin when we no longer have her around anymore. i don't want to sound callous. maybe some of the stuff that i've had going on in my head the last few months won't allow me to place too much weight into losing a furry friend. but i am very sad for hannah. she's not old enough for a life and death talk. i can't explain degrees of loss to her.

i can just tell her that punkin loved her very much. because she would show her attention. and let her take naps on the couch with her when daddy would push her away. i can let her enjoy what time we have left with punkin and hope that she's old enough to store fond memories of her to recollect many years later.

oh, punkin.