catnipoflife

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Boots, aka Bootsie (May 30, 2009 – June 21, 2013)

Today I had to say farewell to my precious companion, Bootsie. She was missing for 14 hrs a couple of days ago and when she returned home she was very loving. Normally she would go right to her food bowl completely starved and scoff up a whole can of cat food. This night was different.

I heard her little bell attached to her collar and looked up happily to see her after being gone so long. She walked straight toward me and hopped onto the recliner where I was sitting and gingerly put her head in my lap. That is where she stayed for a couple of hours. When I got up to get ready for bed, she got down and meandered toward the bedroom. I heard her throwing up during the night and thought it was the usual hairball. The morning disclosed her on the bathroom rug where she sometimes loved to nap and I could tell she was really sick.

I immediately dressed and took her to the vet on my way to the hospital to visit my husband. Upon returning home later that afternoon, I stopped by to see how she was doing. She was dehydrated and still had not eaten any food. She was being given fluids to rehydrate her. I petted her and told her how much I missed and loved her but she was not very responsive. Not like her usual self anyway. She meowed but did not purr.

Upon my return home from the hospital today I stopped in for another visit. This was around noon for I had come home early. Never did I envision this would be the last time I would see her. She had to undergo surgery because of the appearance of a mass in her internal organs. There is a lot of complex long medical jargoneze that I cannot repeat, let alone spell. I did decipher that part of her intestines had literally died. It was a very unusual case according to the vet. At least she died peacefully and did not have to endure long time suffering.

Bootsie came to live with us four years ago after being abused and abandoned. She literally decided to live with us.

Hey, did you know
Cats actually choose you?
You don’t choose them
They stay because they want to

You may give one a loving home
No matter the time or season
He may just choose to go away
Without any rhyme or reason

It’s like virtual catnip—
Feline friends may elect to remain
If the home is inviting
Strongly attractive, not too mundane

Here today, gone tomorrow
A sad refrain so often misunderstood
Why did he choose to leave, not stay?
You did everything to make him feel good

It’s not what you did or didn’t do
Cats are finicky needless to say
With a mind and will of their own
The choice is theirs to leave or to stay

Thank you, precious Bootsie, for choosing to stay and bringing such joy into our lives! You will be deeply missed!  

“With the qualities of cleanliness, affection, patience, dignity and courage that cats have, how many of us, I ask you, would be capable of becoming cats?” —Fernand Mery (Veterinarian and wildlife writer, 1897–1984)