Housemates

Loki and Muldoon
Quickly adapting to a new home 

It's hard to believe, but it was twelve years ago this month that I adopted my two cats.  Time passes quickly when you're cleaning up hair balls.

It was a day or two after Thanksgiving.  My brother and sister and their families were visiting for the holidays, as well as Pascal, a family friend and hiking companion who was attending U.B.C. in Vancouver at the time.  They persuaded me that I had grieved long enough for my two earlier cats, the latest of whom had passed on to Catnip Heaven 18 months earlier.  Duly persuaded, I descended, joined by all my guests, on the Seattle Animal Shelter.

I understand how the admissions office at Harvard feels. So many worthy candidates, but a limited number of places to fill.  I finally settled on a perky all-black kitten, and a quieter adolescent -- both males.  Loki and Muldoon, respectively.  Loki had been picked up on the street -- one of Seattle's many homeless and hungry.  Muldoon, several months older, had been surrendered following the death of his short-time owner, a victim of cancer -- and something about that experience had left Muldoon timid and chronically anxious.

Twelve years later, they have created frequent headaches, but have proved more than worth every cranial pain I've suffeed.  Loki is still kittenish, although now more cuddly.  Muldoon, after many years, has learned to both crave and demand the affection that he at first resisted with panic.  They are well into middle age, but who knows how many years they still have left?  My last two cats had long lives:  Lyta lived well past her 19th birthday; Theseus disappeared early one morning at the age of 16, shortly after being diagnosed with a possibly operable tumor.

No one is immortal, not even those of us with nine lives, and parting with a pet is always painful.  Some people avoid the pain of a pet's death by refusing to accept the joys of a pet's life.  Carried to its logical extreme, one would wish that he himself had never been born.

Happy anniversary, Loki and Muldoon.  Hey!  I've told you NOT to scratch your claws on that chair!