Tabby

During the night of November 8-9, while my husband took out the trash, Tabby got out of the house unseen.  When I woke up after 2:00 AM, I realized something was wrong because she did not appear when Pudge did for her morning meal, nor had she slept beside me during the night as she usually did.

After feeding Pudge, I put on a coat and went outside in the dark and cold to call her name.  I figured she must be nearby and would return home soon.  Later that morning and that day, I would go outside, walking the entire neighborhood, searching for her.  I would do this for the next several days, becoming more concerned as each day passed.

I spend hours searching for her, as did my husband.  I alerted others that she was missing.  We put up fliers with that same picture above all over our neighborhood.  I joined lost pet groups and posted her image and details on several online sites.  Nothing.  No word.

We were beginning to worry that she had been kidnapped or was stuck somewhere so she could not make her way home.  The days passed.  Still nothing as the following weekend arrived.  

We visited a brambles by the golf course where stray cats are fed by cat lovers.  She was not there and, again, nobody had seen her.  We went there more than once, calling her over and over again, as well as walking our neighborhood at all hours of the day and night.

Finally, I got a post early Monday morning, November 16, from a man who lived in our gated community and was certain he had seen her on Lincoln, drinking water from the gutter over the weekend.  That entire day, we repeatedly searched that block of Lincoln and surrounding blocks of houses.  I and then both of us searched the golf course behind the row of houses that backed up against the golf course off of Lincoln.  Still nothing even after seven extensive visits to the entire area.  We put up flyers there, too.

Early Tuesday morning, I had a phone call from a number I did not recognize so I let it go to voice mail.  When I read the text, the caller said that he saw her, unfortunately, between his house and his immediate neighbor.  The address was not complete but I was certain where his house was on Lincoln.  I got in my car and drove there, which was only three blocks or so away.

I parked in front of the house I was sure was the right one, got out and moved around to where the small, red gravel covered the ground between the two houses.  I saw her body almost immediately.  She was clearly dead, lying on her side.  I noticed that it appeared that her legs had churned the small pebbles a bit before she died.  I grabbed the towel I had brought with me, carefully wrapping her stiffened form lovingly in between my tears and increasing anguish.  

I carefully laid her lifeless body in the trunk and drove home.  I bawled as I woke my husband to tell him what had happened and he became as emotional as I since he had been the last to see her alive.

She had always been such a sweet, gentle, loving kitty.  When I had been gone three days to the hospital for acute diverticulitis, after I returned home and lay down on our bed, still exhausted, she lay beside me and put her paw on my arm to comfort me, apparently pleased to have me home.

I would never understand why she left the house and managed to wander so far away, not hear us calling for her so continuously, nor attempt to return home even though we left out food, her litter box, her cat tower, and anything else others had recommended putting out, to induce her to return home.  Eight days she was gone.  The weather had been cold at night, and she did not have her favorite food nor fresh water.  She may have had diabetic issues though she was never overweight, but I still have a difficult time accepting that she had gone off to die.  She was always still hungry whenever it was time to be fed.

Her passing has left a void in the house.  When you are used to two cats and now only one remains, it's noticeable.  We even suspect that Pudge has missed her too.  She used to lay on the kitchen floor and watch my husband clean the floor.  

She was 15 years old, three years younger than Pudge, who appears to be in good health.  At my own age, I don't really want to get another pet.  It's become too hard to lose that pet.  It's gotten harder not easier.  And I hated that Tabby died alone, between two strange houses, having died during those early hours, never having made it back home where she was so loved.  But I brought her home for the last time, though it saddens me deeply still.