Reg died today. The last of our trio of cats, Reggie, Ronnie and Charlie. He was 18 years of age, increasingly frail, with a whole load of conditions which were treated with drugs. In recent days, we knew his time had come and a visit to the vet today convinced us that the time had come to have him put to sleep. We were heartbroken and for the first time in a very long time, I cried. Bye, bye, Reg; our last cat. We hope you enjoyed your life. But hang on: I cried? I thought I couldn’t do that anymore.
I’ve written before how I have found it impossible to cry, despite the loss of so many family members and friends this year. I had no idea. Was it because of my medication? Had I become oblivious to grief? Either way, I felt the loss, I felt the grief, but I didn’t cry. I didn’t even have to fight the tears (not that I think anyone should fight the tears). But today, saying goodbye to the little black cat, with his sweet white mittens, who we adopted from the Cats Protection League, after he had been found, abandoned as a kitten, walking the streets of Filton alone, tears arrived. He had been part of our lives almost every day since, but why was I crying? Was his death really that more distressing than that of actual humans? Obviously not.
The answer, I think, is that we spent more time with Reg than anyone else. We fed and watered him, cared for him when he was sick, played with him, laughed at his eccentricities, grumbled when he woke us up in the middle of the night because his bowl was empty – oh, you know, all the things that cats do. And, as with our previous four cats (Fred and Sid were the first two), we loved him to bits.
We were in the room as the kindly vet administered the fatal injection which hastened his death. It was over in seconds. The vet checked his heart: it had stopped. Reg was dead. Long live Reg.
Around five hours later, I am in a better place. I still have the odd wobble and my partner has an even bigger wobble, but we know we did the right thing. The selfish thing would have been to keep him alive, in pain, living only as existence, lacking quality, unable to do the things he loved to do. It was our decision and ours alone.
I am sorry to those I did not and could not mourn with tears. I didn’t love you any less than our old cat.
To Reg, we will miss you, as we miss our other cats. We will bury your ashes in your favourite place at the bottom of the garden, where you sheltered from the sun, in the dappled light. You were our funny boy, that’s what we called you. And our lives will never be the same again.
