The cycle of life took another turn today. We had to put down Sox, one of our two kitties, because she had gotten into bad shape, and was suffering. Actually, considering she was 15 years old, give or take, she wasn’t in that bad shape. But fifteen is pushing it for cats.
Besides, Sox was a fighter, and I’m sure she wouldn’t have wanted to go out totally enfeebled. She always reminded me of a line from Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns, about Batman coming out of retirement: surely the fiercest survivor, the purest warrior. She started out life as a stray and had to be re-adopted, by us, because her first family developed an allergy to cats.
Shortly after Sox joined our family Caroline came up to me while I was getting dressed for work and said “Daddy, there’s a dead baby fawn outside our side door.” To which I responded, “Right, Caroline, of course there is”.
But when I went downstairs — holy !#$!$#!!! — there really was a dead baby fawn on the side deck. And Sox, looking very prideful. Now I doubt she killed the fawn. Even as a newborn it was bigger and heavier than she was. But I have no doubt she dragged it from wherever she found it up onto the deck to share with us. She had that kind of determination.
She was also the only cat I’ve lived with which my neighbors used to greet when she trotted after us on walks. Why? Because she apparently hunted down and killed every gopher in the area.
But she was friendly and outgoing and cuddly and loved to play, too. Her reflexes were blindingly fast, as I experienced, painfully, on several occasions while teasing her with a string or cat toy. But if you respected her, she would respect you, and sit purring in your lap for hours.
We miss her.
