One less bell to answer . . .

She has been mentioned here previously. She protected our home from small, rodent invaders and other invaders as well.

For as sick as she is, this captures her surprisingly well.

We had moved to Texas, to the Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) metroplex, for career related reasons. While not originally thrilled with the move to Texas, we warmed to the place as we spent time there. We originally could see horses and long-horn cattle in their pastures from our front yard. That changed during our first year as there was an explosion of development in our area. To the point that the pastures that surrounded us were replaced with housing areas, schools, roads, and other development. All of those field mice needed to find a place to live.

We had two hundred pounds of laughing, Labrador retrievers living with us, availing themselves of the dog door for them in the back door of the house. And so did the field mice and rats being kicked up by the earth movers and other heavy, construction machinery. To the point where we would catch movement in the corner of our vision, turning to find that there was a really good (bad) reason for that movement - rodents in the house. This kept going to the point where this time, when Number One Daughter asked for a cat for her birthday, My Bride was more than pleased to oblige.

Albeit grudgingly.

Still . . . Agreement.

So off to the local Humane Society we went, for to obtain a member of the species Felus Domesticus for to thrill the female of the progeny - and guard the manse and repel boarders. Number One Daughter managed to find a kitten that caught her eye. One that the vet once described as "a splendid example of a tortise-shell tabby". As a kitten our one of our friends who always had cats described the Kayli kitten as a "devil kitten". She was very active.

Your humble scribe was smitten by a cat while there, we returned to the Domestic Fortress with two members of the Felus Domesticus instead of just one. Kayli and Buffy the Mouse Slayer (My Bride has a way with words, but this also gives you an idea of the time frame involved here). Buffy was a stray that was rounded up and subsequently taught Kayli how to mouse. Well.

Buffy had a habit of taking off for days at a time until she was found in a ditch by some folks who were grateful to meet us and thank us for her activities in their backyard. Apparently Buffy had been eliminating the wood rat population and making their yard safe for their children to play in.

Leaving behind an experienced, well trained mouser in KayliKat.

Enter Angel about whom I've previously expounded. Sadly, in the past tense, but for the narrative as we are currently experiencing it, all in the future.  ;-)

So, to replace Buffy we took delivery of a barn cat. Instead of naming her Buffy (already done) we named her Angel. Go look up the series if it doesn't make sense. I'll wait here.

Kayli was a young, mature cat that took the young kitten under her wing and taught her to hunt. They became a team.

They weren't just good hunters, they were the chlorine in the gene pool where we lived in Texas.

Note: I began this post shortly after Kayli died, over four years ago. I am just now able to finish it though with surprising difficulty.

After Angel died, Kayli hung on for another 18 months. As I packed one morning, for to go forth and do my part to keep the Manse in cat food and other victuals, I scritched her behind the ear as she lay on the foot of my bed and said good bye to her. I was on my way to work and thence to do my best impression of a salmon and enter the City at the height of rush hour to the Port of Air. That mystical place whereby one may part with ones hard earned lucre for the opportunity to ride upon the wings of a Friendly Sky and be whisked to a distant land. Dallas in this case for to my eldest progeny, the one and only Number One Daughter. We spent a wonderful weekend with her and her girlfriend (now wife).

Upon our return we were unable to find Kayli. Normally said feline is at the door to remonstrate us with our absence and letting us know how worship of her personage has lacked and what are we going to do about it? And thence allowing us to immediately begin the worshiping and spoiling of said feline goddess.

But not this time.

No remonstration.

No guilt trips.

No scolding.

Nothing.

Nothing at all.

So we searched for her in all her usual places. To no avail.

Not downstairs in her usual haunts in the basement. Not in any bed. And not responding to any call on our part.

Which just doesn't happen. We have an understanding. We only call her when there is good reason for her to meet with us.

Love.

Food.

Scritches!

Nada.

My Bride and I looked at each other with foreboding and switched from rescue to recovery.

Kayli was suffering from renal problems and we now began to suspect she had died while we were gone and we were looking for her body.

Only I looked in her heated cat bed and there she was. She looked up at me and lay back down again.

One had but to glance at her to understand that while she lived, she was very, very sick indeed.

This was a shock to me as only three days previously she was healthy, happy, and responded normally to me as I said goodbye to her and headed out the door.

As I had for 17 years.

She managed to get up and stagger around the house for a bit. We opened the door so she could go out on the screened in porch where she lie in the sun and enjoyed the outdoors.

The picture at the top of this post is from that last visit to her porch.

We took her to the vet who informed us her renal problems had morphed into renal failure and Kayli's time had come.
Even now, over four years later this is very difficult to write, the hole her absence left in my life is only slightly smaller after four years and still much larger than her physical size.

Kayli passed away in the clinic in our arms and it was one of the most difficult things I've done in my life. As the dust in the room I'm currently sitting in rises in a cloud.

She slept next to me every night. For over 15 years she would come to bed, butt my shoulder with her head so I would lift my right arm and bed covers. She would crawl down my side, then turn around and come back up to lie next to me with her head on my shoulder. Once in place she would roll into me whereupon I would lower the bed clothes over her and we would go to sleep with her purring in my ears.

It took me over two weeks to learn to sleep without her next to me, so much had she become a part of my normal sleeping routine.

It is four years now and while I am finally able to finish this post, I am raw with the rush of the memory. I can still see her lying on the foot of the bed when I am home even though her cremains sit on my dresser in a can.

Right next to Angel.

We belled the cat just before we made her an indoor cat but she retained the bell to the end. I would hear it as she scampered about the house still retaining some kitten in her almost to the end.

Hearing that bell all those years, knowing I'll never hear it again reminds me of this song,

"One less bell to answer, one less egg to fry.
One less cat to pick up after.
I should be happy, but all I do is cry."

--marcus