Butters, you were a great cat and will be missed
So Butters, officially my roommate's cat and brother to the infamous Pope who is officially my cat, passed away earlier tonight. I am pretty sure it was a huge stroke, and he thankfully went very quickly. He was being totally normal, sitting on the back of the couch with Tricia and me, when he lept up, ran into the kitchen, and collapsed. Tricia ran to follow him, saw him twitch a few times, heard him make a tiny meow, and called for me. By the time I ran into the kitchen, his pupils were fully dialated, he wasn't breathing, and had no pulse. And that didn't change. We were both there with him, and I could see his tongue was already turning blue. We rushed to the car, me in my pjs and flip flops, and I tried in vain to resucitate him in the car (without my seat belt, it turns out) while we searched for the all-night, emergency vet. But he wasn't breathing and had no pulse nearly immediately, so I suppose that was just me trying everything I could think of in hopes that it would work.
And while part of my brain knows this is stupid, I feel so bad for the cat CPR for not working, for forgetting in the car how to find the vet ER, for basically not being able to save that cat. I feel awful for Tricia, he really was *her* cat, and I wish I could have done more, hadn't screwed up. And now she's moving out into her own place at the end of the month, and she'll really be all alone. No Butters to move with her, and that makes me feel even worse for not being able to do something. Which, I also feel bad about because I know there wasn't anything else to be done and that I did everything possible. But I do, even if it makes no sense at all.
It's been a very long time since I've had a pet that passed away, or even a family member or friend who wasn't either very old or very sick (and in most cases both), that it seems I've forgotten how sudden and terrible and awful all this is. And I know Butters was "just a cat" but we got him and Pope only a few months after I moved into my house, only a year after I started grad school, only a year after my divorce, when he was a teeny tiny grey and white fuzzball. So he may have just been a cat, but he meant a lot to me. And I already miss him terribly.
So I'm sitting in the living room trying not to cry too loud, trying not to remember how Butters loved to grab the Kleenex out of the box while I take one for myself, and most of all trying to not listen to Pope, his brother, wander around the house looking for his brother.
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And while part of my brain knows this is stupid, I feel so bad for the cat CPR for not working, for forgetting in the car how to find the vet ER, for basically not being able to save that cat. I feel awful for Tricia, he really was *her* cat, and I wish I could have done more, hadn't screwed up. And now she's moving out into her own place at the end of the month, and she'll really be all alone. No Butters to move with her, and that makes me feel even worse for not being able to do something. Which, I also feel bad about because I know there wasn't anything else to be done and that I did everything possible. But I do, even if it makes no sense at all.
It's been a very long time since I've had a pet that passed away, or even a family member or friend who wasn't either very old or very sick (and in most cases both), that it seems I've forgotten how sudden and terrible and awful all this is. And I know Butters was "just a cat" but we got him and Pope only a few months after I moved into my house, only a year after I started grad school, only a year after my divorce, when he was a teeny tiny grey and white fuzzball. So he may have just been a cat, but he meant a lot to me. And I already miss him terribly.
So I'm sitting in the living room trying not to cry too loud, trying not to remember how Butters loved to grab the Kleenex out of the box while I take one for myself, and most of all trying to not listen to Pope, his brother, wander around the house looking for his brother.
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