(no subject)
Today I directed the handbell choir in three songs for a concert, applied for my teaching certificate, ooohed and ahhhed Amy's shiny new copy of RotK:EE, baked a second batch of peppernuts, and went to the Christmas concert for my old high school.
And then my mom called me to tell me that tomorrow they will be taking my sixteen-year-old cat, Olympia, to the vet to be put to sleep.
Yes, I knew this was coming. In fact, I knew it would probably be this week. But I still want to cry. We've had Olympia a long, long time. I may or may not see him one more time tomorrow, depending on what kind of appointment they get with the vet, and whether I can run home quick after student-teaching. Olympia may now be blind and senile, but he still knows me.
Here follow some stories and anecdotes of this beloved cat, from when we bought him in August of 1988, until recently.
Naming
--I can remember when my parents told me we were finally going to get a cat. I was beside myself with joy: I'd always wanted one, but my parents wouldn't buy one until my little brother was old enough to not cause any harm--to the cat or to himself. We bought him from a pet store in the mall, and he had two siblings in the cage with him. They were mostly white with black spots, but the kitten we asked to see was mostly black on top with a white belly and socks, and odd puzzle-like markings on his face. We spent a few moments in a little room with him, where he could sniff us out and we could get to know him a bit. Shortly thereafter he was bundled in a little cardboard carrier and I was allowed to carry him out.
He mewed the whole way. I wondered aloud what was wrong with him. Mom said he missed his mother and that perhaps we should have put a ticking clock in with him, because it would sound like a heartbeat. My evil older brother Daniel suggested it should be an alarm clock so that when it went off it would scare the poor kitten half to death. I got upset, but Mom distracted him by suggesting names: "Puzzle," "Checkers," "Paws," ("Claws!" Daniel piped up). But none of those were right.
The first afternoon we had him home, we closed off a hallway for him to explore, as he was much too small to be allowed in the rest of the house. There was a shelf in that hall with toys on it. A barrel of building-blocks stood at one end. Our new kitten climbed up the toys, stood on the barrel for a moment, then leaped off. Then he did it again. Given that it was an Olympic year and it was therefore on Daniel's mind, he suggested "Olympia."
It didn't occur to any of us that "Olympia" was a feminine name until too late. The cat was named. Eventually, we extended it to "Olympia H. Kittykitty" because when Mom called him in at night, she'd say, "O-LYYYYM-pia! HEEEEERE kittykittykittykitty!" and Olympia responded to the last two names as readily as the first two. He would also perk up at "Lympers," "Kitty," "Cat," "Fuzzball," and "Food." Though, of course, the last one usually meant he'd try to race you to the kitchen.
Roaming
--The first time Olympia was ever allowed outdoors was Easter of 1989. It was a very windy day, and he didn't like the wind one bit. He never got used to it, either. But he loved going outdoors, and as we left him all his claws, he became quite a hunter. In fact we discovered this first after he got locked in the basement for several hours. Our old house had a musty old basement which Olympia initially avoided, but one day the cat simply could not be found. For a while there we were wondering whether he'd become road pizza, and were calling him outside and scouring every nook and cranny of the house. Then one of us, standing in the dining room, heard his distinctive Siamese meow (which is more like maaowww). It was coming from the basement door. We opened it, and lo and behold, Olympia trotted in. There were cobwebs in his whiskers, but he looked quite pleased with himself. Not long after, we began finding the carcasses of garter snakes he'd caught. They got in through a door from the basement to the backyard. Fortunately, Olympia generally left the snakes where he found them.
Over the course of his life, Olympia caught numerous birds, squirrells, mice, baby rabbits, and snakes. Once, my dad found him with a full-grown cottontail he'd killed. He would often leave parts of his kills on our front porch--disgusting, I know, but in cat-etiquette an enormous compliment to us.
Olympia wandered far from our house. We moved when he was two years old, but he readjusted quickly and came to love the neighborhood. A friend once found one of Olympia's collars in the parkinglot of our church, two blocks away (Olympia hated collars, and would only ever bear wearing a flea-collar). He fought from time to time, earning himself three abscesses before we decided enough was enough and started keeping him inside at night. Before that, he'd often wake my parents up at three AM, yowling to come in.
He could often be seen spying out the spirea bushes in our front yard, where many small animals nested. He'd just sit there for an hour or two--we dubbed it Kitty TV. He liked balancing on the split-rail fence by our driveway, or running through the long grass in our neighbors' field, or just stalking anything that came in sight. One of our neighbors had dogs, and it wasn't long before Olympia figured out that the dogs could not cross the fence as he could. He would purposefully walk slowly two feet away from the poor, trapped hounds, tail held high, watching them go nuts.
Olympia vs. Other Pets
When we got Olympia, he was the lone pet in the house, but not for long. My mom bought a canary whom she named Larry (Larry the Canary, Larry Bird, Larnell Harris, take your pick) and hung him in a black cage in her kitchen. Nearby was one of those trashcans where if you step on the pedal, the lid comes up. Soon Olympia developed the habit of sitting on the trashcan to watch Larry (which was rather funny when we went to throw things away: you'd step on the pedal and Olympia would hang on for dear life when the lid came up). One night we were in the living room watching TV when we heard a loud CRASH! followed by a THUMP! We ran to the kitchen to find Larry going nuts, his cage swinging wildly, and Olympia sprawled on the kitchen floor, looking dazed. Apparently he hadn't considered the difficulties of the cage.
The next pet Olympia encountered he had better success with. I don't think we had Noel the parakeet for a few months before Mom forgot to put Olympia out while cleaning Noel's cage. Noel hopped out and Olympia got him in one bite. Mom chased Olympia around the house with a broom and eventually convinced him to drop the bird, but of course it was too late. After Noel came Violet, but fortunately Olympia had to be content with just looking. Violet died semi-peacefully of a cold draught after enduring Olympia's hungry stares for several years.
However, when it came to a contest between Olympia the Mighty Hunter and Gizmo the Timid Guinea-Pig, Gizmo won. We still haven't figured out why. Daniel put the two on a chair together to see what would happen, and Gizmo, for reasons yet unknown, bit Olympia's tail. Olympia was off like a shot and never came within smelling distance of him for the rest of the guinea-pig's life.
Habits of a Cat
Olympia, all his life, was convinced that my mom was his mom. He followed her everywhere. Every night he would sit with her on her work-room couch while Mom watched TV and would sleep next to her. There came a week not long ago when I was house sitting. Every evening Olympia would drive me nuts, yowling and yowling, whether I had him inside or on the breezeway, where he usually spent the nights. Then, all at once, it hit me. I got a book, went to Mom's work-room, and sat down on the couch to read. Olympia followed and curled up next to me. Within minutes he was asleep, and even when I put him out on the breezeway he didn't protest.
Olympia didn't scare too easily, though he hated dogs, vacuum cleaners, and the sound of a plastic bag being shaken. And guinea-pigs. But he was fun to startle. I'd play with him, pretending that my hand was a claw, and he'd have fun attacking it. One day, though, he got very wired, and when I went to got up I startled him on accident, and he ran smack into a wall. Another time, I came home from work to find my parents in the work-room watching TV, and Olympia asleep between them. I went to stand next to my dad. Now, Dad is convinced that it's absolutely hilarous the way I squeal when he grabs my waist. So when I wasn't looking, he did so. I squealed, and startled Olympia. He leaped out of Mom's lap, claws extended, and went skidding across the floor. Mom smacked Dad. She motioned to the claw-marks Olympia left in her leg and said, "NEVER do that again!"
Olympia seemed to think that the frilly edge of my nightgown was a terribly exciting thing, and would come running up behind me, leap and swat at my nightgown, and then go running off again. He slept on my bed from time to time, preferring the dip between my outstretched legs. He loathed being picked up, but loved being petted, and often jumped on my dad's lap when we were done with supper. Dad would give him bones, which he licked clean.
The other things he licked clean were ice-cream bowls. We learned to turn them upside-down on the counter when we were done, or they'd turn up mysteriously washed the next day. But that was better than the time he ate the toppings off an entire pizza when we weren't looking. All that was left was the slimy crust, completely devoid of cheese, meat, and tomato sauce. And of course, all he would do while you were in the kitchen was attempt to reach the counter while standing on his back paws, his front paw patting the edge of the countertop as he yowled.
He was a talkative cat. If you talked to him, he'd respond with short "maah"s. And he had this weird habit of yawning in the middle of a meow. It was like "maaOOOOUW." We always wondered how he expected us to take him seriously when he did that.
I was the first to notice that something was wrong, when I came home from school a year or two ago and noticed that his eyes looked funny. They seemed reddish, and they didn't dilate properly. Not long after they went milky white, and we discovered that he had gone blind. We took to putting a harness on him so that he might be leashed to a stake in the yard, as he still loved the outdoors. It wasn't long after that before he began to move stiffly, and showed signs of senility. Lately he's become incontinent. Mom's sure he's also diabetic. There's really nothing left to do.
I'll miss him terribly.
And then my mom called me to tell me that tomorrow they will be taking my sixteen-year-old cat, Olympia, to the vet to be put to sleep.
Yes, I knew this was coming. In fact, I knew it would probably be this week. But I still want to cry. We've had Olympia a long, long time. I may or may not see him one more time tomorrow, depending on what kind of appointment they get with the vet, and whether I can run home quick after student-teaching. Olympia may now be blind and senile, but he still knows me.
Here follow some stories and anecdotes of this beloved cat, from when we bought him in August of 1988, until recently.
Naming
--I can remember when my parents told me we were finally going to get a cat. I was beside myself with joy: I'd always wanted one, but my parents wouldn't buy one until my little brother was old enough to not cause any harm--to the cat or to himself. We bought him from a pet store in the mall, and he had two siblings in the cage with him. They were mostly white with black spots, but the kitten we asked to see was mostly black on top with a white belly and socks, and odd puzzle-like markings on his face. We spent a few moments in a little room with him, where he could sniff us out and we could get to know him a bit. Shortly thereafter he was bundled in a little cardboard carrier and I was allowed to carry him out.
He mewed the whole way. I wondered aloud what was wrong with him. Mom said he missed his mother and that perhaps we should have put a ticking clock in with him, because it would sound like a heartbeat. My evil older brother Daniel suggested it should be an alarm clock so that when it went off it would scare the poor kitten half to death. I got upset, but Mom distracted him by suggesting names: "Puzzle," "Checkers," "Paws," ("Claws!" Daniel piped up). But none of those were right.
The first afternoon we had him home, we closed off a hallway for him to explore, as he was much too small to be allowed in the rest of the house. There was a shelf in that hall with toys on it. A barrel of building-blocks stood at one end. Our new kitten climbed up the toys, stood on the barrel for a moment, then leaped off. Then he did it again. Given that it was an Olympic year and it was therefore on Daniel's mind, he suggested "Olympia."
It didn't occur to any of us that "Olympia" was a feminine name until too late. The cat was named. Eventually, we extended it to "Olympia H. Kittykitty" because when Mom called him in at night, she'd say, "O-LYYYYM-pia! HEEEEERE kittykittykittykitty!" and Olympia responded to the last two names as readily as the first two. He would also perk up at "Lympers," "Kitty," "Cat," "Fuzzball," and "Food." Though, of course, the last one usually meant he'd try to race you to the kitchen.
Roaming
--The first time Olympia was ever allowed outdoors was Easter of 1989. It was a very windy day, and he didn't like the wind one bit. He never got used to it, either. But he loved going outdoors, and as we left him all his claws, he became quite a hunter. In fact we discovered this first after he got locked in the basement for several hours. Our old house had a musty old basement which Olympia initially avoided, but one day the cat simply could not be found. For a while there we were wondering whether he'd become road pizza, and were calling him outside and scouring every nook and cranny of the house. Then one of us, standing in the dining room, heard his distinctive Siamese meow (which is more like maaowww). It was coming from the basement door. We opened it, and lo and behold, Olympia trotted in. There were cobwebs in his whiskers, but he looked quite pleased with himself. Not long after, we began finding the carcasses of garter snakes he'd caught. They got in through a door from the basement to the backyard. Fortunately, Olympia generally left the snakes where he found them.
Over the course of his life, Olympia caught numerous birds, squirrells, mice, baby rabbits, and snakes. Once, my dad found him with a full-grown cottontail he'd killed. He would often leave parts of his kills on our front porch--disgusting, I know, but in cat-etiquette an enormous compliment to us.
Olympia wandered far from our house. We moved when he was two years old, but he readjusted quickly and came to love the neighborhood. A friend once found one of Olympia's collars in the parkinglot of our church, two blocks away (Olympia hated collars, and would only ever bear wearing a flea-collar). He fought from time to time, earning himself three abscesses before we decided enough was enough and started keeping him inside at night. Before that, he'd often wake my parents up at three AM, yowling to come in.
He could often be seen spying out the spirea bushes in our front yard, where many small animals nested. He'd just sit there for an hour or two--we dubbed it Kitty TV. He liked balancing on the split-rail fence by our driveway, or running through the long grass in our neighbors' field, or just stalking anything that came in sight. One of our neighbors had dogs, and it wasn't long before Olympia figured out that the dogs could not cross the fence as he could. He would purposefully walk slowly two feet away from the poor, trapped hounds, tail held high, watching them go nuts.
Olympia vs. Other Pets
When we got Olympia, he was the lone pet in the house, but not for long. My mom bought a canary whom she named Larry (Larry the Canary, Larry Bird, Larnell Harris, take your pick) and hung him in a black cage in her kitchen. Nearby was one of those trashcans where if you step on the pedal, the lid comes up. Soon Olympia developed the habit of sitting on the trashcan to watch Larry (which was rather funny when we went to throw things away: you'd step on the pedal and Olympia would hang on for dear life when the lid came up). One night we were in the living room watching TV when we heard a loud CRASH! followed by a THUMP! We ran to the kitchen to find Larry going nuts, his cage swinging wildly, and Olympia sprawled on the kitchen floor, looking dazed. Apparently he hadn't considered the difficulties of the cage.
The next pet Olympia encountered he had better success with. I don't think we had Noel the parakeet for a few months before Mom forgot to put Olympia out while cleaning Noel's cage. Noel hopped out and Olympia got him in one bite. Mom chased Olympia around the house with a broom and eventually convinced him to drop the bird, but of course it was too late. After Noel came Violet, but fortunately Olympia had to be content with just looking. Violet died semi-peacefully of a cold draught after enduring Olympia's hungry stares for several years.
However, when it came to a contest between Olympia the Mighty Hunter and Gizmo the Timid Guinea-Pig, Gizmo won. We still haven't figured out why. Daniel put the two on a chair together to see what would happen, and Gizmo, for reasons yet unknown, bit Olympia's tail. Olympia was off like a shot and never came within smelling distance of him for the rest of the guinea-pig's life.
Habits of a Cat
Olympia, all his life, was convinced that my mom was his mom. He followed her everywhere. Every night he would sit with her on her work-room couch while Mom watched TV and would sleep next to her. There came a week not long ago when I was house sitting. Every evening Olympia would drive me nuts, yowling and yowling, whether I had him inside or on the breezeway, where he usually spent the nights. Then, all at once, it hit me. I got a book, went to Mom's work-room, and sat down on the couch to read. Olympia followed and curled up next to me. Within minutes he was asleep, and even when I put him out on the breezeway he didn't protest.
Olympia didn't scare too easily, though he hated dogs, vacuum cleaners, and the sound of a plastic bag being shaken. And guinea-pigs. But he was fun to startle. I'd play with him, pretending that my hand was a claw, and he'd have fun attacking it. One day, though, he got very wired, and when I went to got up I startled him on accident, and he ran smack into a wall. Another time, I came home from work to find my parents in the work-room watching TV, and Olympia asleep between them. I went to stand next to my dad. Now, Dad is convinced that it's absolutely hilarous the way I squeal when he grabs my waist. So when I wasn't looking, he did so. I squealed, and startled Olympia. He leaped out of Mom's lap, claws extended, and went skidding across the floor. Mom smacked Dad. She motioned to the claw-marks Olympia left in her leg and said, "NEVER do that again!"
Olympia seemed to think that the frilly edge of my nightgown was a terribly exciting thing, and would come running up behind me, leap and swat at my nightgown, and then go running off again. He slept on my bed from time to time, preferring the dip between my outstretched legs. He loathed being picked up, but loved being petted, and often jumped on my dad's lap when we were done with supper. Dad would give him bones, which he licked clean.
The other things he licked clean were ice-cream bowls. We learned to turn them upside-down on the counter when we were done, or they'd turn up mysteriously washed the next day. But that was better than the time he ate the toppings off an entire pizza when we weren't looking. All that was left was the slimy crust, completely devoid of cheese, meat, and tomato sauce. And of course, all he would do while you were in the kitchen was attempt to reach the counter while standing on his back paws, his front paw patting the edge of the countertop as he yowled.
He was a talkative cat. If you talked to him, he'd respond with short "maah"s. And he had this weird habit of yawning in the middle of a meow. It was like "maaOOOOUW." We always wondered how he expected us to take him seriously when he did that.
I was the first to notice that something was wrong, when I came home from school a year or two ago and noticed that his eyes looked funny. They seemed reddish, and they didn't dilate properly. Not long after they went milky white, and we discovered that he had gone blind. We took to putting a harness on him so that he might be leashed to a stake in the yard, as he still loved the outdoors. It wasn't long after that before he began to move stiffly, and showed signs of senility. Lately he's become incontinent. Mom's sure he's also diabetic. There's really nothing left to do.
I'll miss him terribly.