The cat-shaped hole in my head
It’s been a couple weeks since the Puggle left home, and I’m pretty well adjusted. I think the main source of my anxiety was the thought of him suffering, and not knowing what I could do for him. But now he’s beyond all that. The high drama of his impending death is over, and it’s just a question of adjusting to his absence as a known, unchangeable fact.
However, before my memory of the Puggle fades, I want to take a moment and record some of the wonderful memories he gave me. Some of these are one-time events, and some are just the gifts he gave me every day. I know these probably won’t mean much to you, but I wanted to save them here for future reference, to serve as a remembrance of his character and the companionship he provided.
So here’s the list.
- Puggie Nose Leather (“Puggie knows leather”)
- His habit of curling up under the covers and going to sleep behind my knee, with his head on my calf
- His habit of pawing at the blanket to let me know he wanted to get under the covers
- His amusing habit of flossing every day using the cord on the blinds
- How he’d often jump onto my lap while I was sitting at the computer, then putting his front paws on my shoulder, asking to be picked up and given a Huggle
- How he’d curl up in the crook of my arm while I was sitting up in bed reading
- The evening ritual of him standing on my chest to get his kitty massage after I climbed into bed
- How he’d invariably sabotage any attempt to make the bed
- Our occasional walks in the lobby: his ”constitutionals“
- How those walks would usually end with him running back to our door after someone in the building spooked him
- The Puggle Skywalk between the countertop and the kitchen table in the Fenway apartment
- The total destruction of the door frames in the Fenway apartment
- The Kitty Crazies, which in the Fenway apartment resulted in him clutching the door frame, suspended four feet off the ground
- His fuzzy Puggle toes
- ”Here comes Puggle Claws, here comes Puggle Claws, right down Puggle Claws Lane. He’s a Puggle ’cos he’s got Puggle claws and a little Pug brain…“
- Sleeping inside a kick drum… amazing
- His completely predictable hissing at any women who visited
- The time he cleaned my bicycle chain for me and got grease all over his face
- Climbing through all the kitchen cabinets
- When I built a little pagoda that allowed him to jump all the way up into the top shelf in the bedroom closet
- His annoying habit of leaving the bathroom door open after he came in and left while I was showering
- ”Reach out… touch face.“
- ”It’s not sex unless the Puggle is watching.“
- Always leaving one of the kitchen barstool chairs pulled partway out so that he could jump up onto the kitchen counter
- Coming home after a weekend away and having to have extended love-fests on the bed before anything else
- His catching a mouse at the Fenway apartment and absolutely having no idea what to do with it
- His Puggie pantaloons
- Wanton shredding of cardboard boxes, and tenderizing them beforehand for him with my Benchmade pocket knife
- Strength-sapping sunbeams
- His habit of sleeping on the bed above (and sometimes atop) one’s head
- Waking up in the morning with the Puggle in the same position as me-on his side, with his body under the covers and his head on the pillow, face-to-face with me
- His climbing up into kitchen cabinet and lying down after I closed the glass doors behind him
- His taking it upon himself to wash my hair for me back when I had long hair
- The rising trill (known as ”mipping“) that he’d make when asking a question or jumping up on the bed
Thank you, Puggle. For these, and for everything.
Edited additions:
- How he’s tell you he'd had enough play by giving you a “nibble”: gently clomping down on you with his teeth, as if to say “I could take a piece out of you if I really wanted, so simmer down, rude boy…”
- And if you didn’t simmer down, he’d give you “the bunny hop”: grabbing you with his front paws and kicking with his legs and his rear claws out.
- “What kinda cat is he? He's an Eviscerator!”
- “Cute, cute little Puggie. I wanna make him stay up all night…”
- His uncanny ability to elude veterinary staff; twice he got away from them and out of the back room, once screaming all the way down the hallway, into the waiting area, and into a corner underneath a table, requiring us to move all their furniture to get him out!