As I was leaving to head into Columbia last night I found Mr. Pink on the side of the road near the driveway. He’d been hit and killed probably hours earlier. He looked as though he’d died immediately, or at least that’s what I’d like to believe.
Pink was the only animal I’d had since it was a baby, and I loved him more than I thought it was possible for me to love an animal. He was my friend, a fuzzy, cuddly, sassy, little friend. The world and especially this coming winter seem a lot more lonely and bleak. He was the only cat I’d ever had that would meow at me not because he was hungry, thirsty, or cold, but because he just wanted my attention, to be picked up like a baby and have his whiskers rubbed. I think that’s what I’m going to miss most about the little turd, the way he’d take me out of whatever work I was doing and make me feel loved even just for a few minutes.
He led a good life, one any cat would envy, even some people. He was born in Berlin, El Salvador on July 1, 2005. His favorite past time in his early years was eating cockroaches, which would have gone mostly undetected if it weren’t for his distaste for their antennae which I would find scattered around the hacienda.
When I came back to the U.S. there were more than a few Salvadorans jealous of Pink’s new found citizenship. Delta had informed that I didn’t need any paperwork for him, because cats don’t need paperwork to my disbelief. I then verified that cats are essentially the only animal that do not need paperwork to enter the United States and only have to “appear healthy”, whatever that means.
At the airport in El Salvador I was asked for his paperwork, and when I told them I had none and didn’t need any I was informed I was wrong. At one point the woman running security told me to just let him go out in the parking lot. That probably gives you an idea of how animals are thought of in many third-world countries. After hours of arguing and almost missing my flight they allowed me to leave their country with him. Thinking the worst was over I was dismayed when the large black woman at the U.S. customs asked for his papers and when I told her I didn’t need them she responded “uh uh honey, every animal needs papers”. I then asked for a supervisor and watched as half a dozen customs employees gathered around a computer terminal to look up the same information on the state department website. Twenty minutes later I was told that I could go without so much as an apology, I suppose they were embarrassed that they didn’t know such a basic aspect of their job.
The ordeal did not end their, as up to that point Pink had dealt with the flights and cage-time stoically, but when the plane from Atlanta to Jackson was delayed over 4 hours he began to reach his limits. As he began to yowl on the flight full of already severely annoyed passengers I reached my hand through a small zipper in his cage to calm him, which worked until the flight attendant angrily told me I couldn’t open my dog’s cage. After informing her that it was a cat and it was the only way I could keep him quiet, she told me that she didn’t care if it was a baby. And that’s how Mr. Pink came to America.
It was clear he was an outdoor cat, but still spent a year in Baltimore shredding carpets and otherwise letting me know he wasn’t pleased with his limited quarters. A year after that he finally got his breathing room and got to his first taste of outdoor living in Virginia. I was terrified he’d be hit by a car on the suburban road or mauled by a dog or any other catastrophe, but I knew I had to let him do his thing if he was going to be happy.
When we came out to the land I’d been mostly worried about wild animals and dogs getting him, but he always seemed to find his way home. He was a very brave cat when it came to dogs, and more often than not would hold his grown rather than run. I once saw him run up and growl at someone coming through my neighbor’s porch door in Baltimore. He seemed to have abnormally long claws, which he kept finely honed by scratching on logs or my couch cushions, whichever was more readily available. I think it was those traits that helped him be successful out in the wilderness. It was only earlier this year that I was told he was actually a Norwegian Forest cat, which makes me think he had an actual genetic predisposition to this type of landscape.
The idea that he would be hit by a car actually never factored in to my thinking since only 20 or 30 cars pass by the road along the property every day. I knew he liked to prowl in the field across the road sometimes and yesterday morning was extremely cold compared to what it had been. My thinking is that his reflexes just weren’t as fast as he’d been used to and couldn’t get across the road or out of the way as quickly as he expected. Either way I’ve tried to reign in my emotions from angrily blaming the driver, my mind wants to think the person was recklessly speeding or sadistically even trying to hit him, but nothing good comes from that way of thinking. He’s gone and there’s nothing I could say or do that’s going to bring the little fluffwad back.
I buried him in the garden between a couple of grape bushes. I wanted to do it right away because I couldn’t stand to see him like that. I sobbed, screamed, and cussed at everything and nothing and put my little buddy to rest. I can’t describe how much I miss him already. He can never be replaced and I just wanted to write down a little about his life and what he meant to me. I was hoping it would be cathartic, but now I’m just weeping and missing him more than ever. Give your loved furballs a rub for me.
