 |
| Ginger- always into something. |
I've been married since July 24th, 1999 and with the exception of two weeks after our marriage and the days since Ginger passed away, my little buddy has been a daily part of my life and my wife's too. It's been really hard with him gone. I know he's a cat but he was one hell of a guy too!
Jan and I haven't been able to have children. We've had several miscarriages. But with Ginger, it was like having a human child. He'd let us hold him like a child, over your shoulder and along for the ride while you put away groceries or cleaned up after dinner. When he wanted food, he'd dance by rising on his back legs and moving his front ones as to say "food goes here" by pointing at his bowl.
Ginger had a soft voice, but he could be loud. His morning greeting to me always sounded like "Dadddeeee!" His was so kind and while he'd get feisty, he never bit me out of meanness. The only time he did bite me was at the vet when a loud bark freaked him out. After the bite, he managed to climb up me and stand on the top of my head, refusing to get down.
Ginger was one of the original 3gatos, a hot sauce brand that I later turned into a hot sauce store that I owned and operated for two years. Ginger also was one of the original Steel Cats. He and his brother Gimli would sit on opposite sides of me as I cheered for my beloved Steelers. When I would yell either for joy or anger, he'd never budge. Mind you, I was way louder than that dog ever was.
Ginger was also a sleeping buddy. He had the routine where first he'd leave the bed, do his rounds as it to remind everybody he was the Alpha. Then he'd come back and start pawing at my back asking me to turn over. It was a great little shoulder rub and I'd let him shiatsu me for a few seconds before I would turn over and he'd either flop across my chest or snuggle up in my arm.
He's been gone 10 days and the house just feels blah. I keep expecting him to jump up on the bed and give me a kitty massage. I miss his voice and most of all, I miss his presence.
When I first meet Ginger, I was still in college. One day on my way to class, this gangly ball of fur and legs meet me at the front door. I told him that I couldn't let him in the house but if he wanted a family, he needed to show up at 6pm. At school, I called Jan to let her know to look for an orange kitten in need of a home. Around 5:30, Jan got home but no cat. I pulled up right at six and sitting on top of Jan's hood was Ginger. But Ginger didn't look like he did when I left him hours earlier. Some jerk had spray painted him pink.
So, I scooped him up, ran into the apartment, grabbed Jan, and we be-lined it to the vet. Thankfully, the vet was able to comb out most of the paint. The prognosis was that if he was fine now, he's probably not going to get worse. Just don't let him lick the paint and it will wear off. (Ginger later won an award from Purina for the story of how he became part of our family.)
As I think of it, it's odd that Ginger's tongue was involved with how he became a part of our family and how he passed away. For a couple of years now, Ginger had diabetes. Ging wasn't fat or a sloth. However, older tabbies get diabetes for some reason and vets are scrambling to learn more about the process.
Sometime in the past year, Ginger developed a lump. But the docs were stumped as to whether it was cancer or not as a biopsy revealed it was comprised of liquid fat. Once again the mutant cat strikes again. Over the time we've had Ginger, he was sprayed hot pink, grew two teeth in the same place at the same time, re-grew a claw after being declawed (a process we'll never do again to any of our babies!), had a brain tumor on his ear (TWICE!), had a urinary blockage, and was a wet nurse for our kitten Lambert. Oh, and he cured himself of diabetes and had a seizure just to let us know his blood sugars had stabilized. Because of his strange medical history, I often tell people that Ginger was born at Sharon Harris (a nearby nuclear plant.)
But a few days before we had to say goodbye to Ginger, he stumped the vet with another medical mystery. Since the days of the dual tooth incident, I do regular tooth checks on our cats. In the process of 3 days, Ginger's tongue went from healthy to something far worse. He'd gone a couple of days not eating. So, I decided to check his mouth once more and there I saw a terrible brown spot on his tongue. The vet said that for some reason his tongue in that area had died and it was possible that the rest would later.
Any hope for antibiotics and more time with my little guy was gone. I had to let him go at that point. But it was horrible to have to decide. I wasn't ready for him to go even if Ginger's body was.
As I type this my oldest girl cat, Lily is snuggled up beside me. She's a very loving cat with a special paw (it's withered and her shoulder is fused, possibly from being hit by a low-riding car.) She's trying very much to be my new sleepy time buddy. Andre, my youngest (and craziest) is trying very awkwardly to become a Steel Cat. He hates loud noises and startles easily. Thankfully, we've got a few months to work on that. Lambert J. has always been a scaredy cat. Ginger, God bless him, worked very hard to bring that boy out of his shell and over the past few weeks and days, Lamby has met that challenge and will get all the way there soon. Sarakit is all over the place in more ways than one. She can't keep still,
but she tries really hard to wake me with a kiss and to snuggle up from time to time.
It's an adjustment period here at the Madman house for both the parents and kitties. I imagine Ginger is in Heaven right now being petting by our five little angels while his previously departed brothers and sister are all sitting around them asking "What are we, chopped liver?"
Ginger was a great fella and so I must paraphrase that old Righteous Brothers song in closing. "If there's a Kitty Heaven, then they just got one hell of a cat as a resident."
No comments:
Post a Comment