I pray that one day I will meet every pet we've ever had, and they number in the 30s, I believe. Today we said goodbye, literally said goodbye while petting him as the very nice vet let our beloved Harry go to that rainbow bridge.
A week ago, he was mostly healthy, we thought. We took him to the vet and were told he had an infection. Three days later, we learned he had an incredibly high blood-sugar count, and that he would have to take shots the rest of his life and the insulin would be costly. No matter, Harry was Harry, so we told them bring it on.
The problem was, it seems, that despite fighting since Wednesday, he was fighting a losing battle. He never really ate again after we brought him home. He never drank. He didn't go to the bathroom. He just was, when he wasn't looking for a spot under the bed like he was looking for a place to die.
Thus Harry, named after author's Jim Butcher's wizard/private detective Harry Dresden, of the huge claws and big boned body and curly black hair, died on Friday the 13th before a full moon could present itself.
We got Harry about six years ago when some idiot put him out into the parking lot of the Slidell bureau of the Times-Picayune. We, despite having pets (so many pets), took him in as we always do. He had a broken tail that was never fixed. It went sprawling in various directions. He never meowed a day in his life. Instead, it was a broken hallelujah, a kind of squeak, though it could get loud when he wanted to.
He picked on some of the cats, truthfully, but he was my wife Mary's baby, from early on. He took the place of her previous baby, Buttons, who preceded Harry. Harry was the only cat that Buttons ever played with, and he did so in his final days after 16 years of loving Mary. Harry literally took Buttons place, for cuddly belly rubs and climbs onto Mary's shoulders, and claws that were too sharp but with which he never learned to put away when he was stretching on Mary's lap. They could be painful, she said.
Today has been hard. We decided when he couldn't seem to stand, and his eyes glazed over, that we would take him in to end what might have been suffering. He raised his head on the way there, magnifying our tears to significant proportions. Wet cheeked, we walked into the vet's office. And it happened with a final pet and a final hug and a final moment spoken to a sleeping Harry.
Sunday I will preach that God turns everything to the good of those who love him. But this Friday the 13th, that is hard to see.
I know all those trials of this life might be mercies in disguise stuff. But it's hard. For the only way this can truly be good, is if I can see Frankie, and Scrappy, and Tweety, and Squeaker, and Buttons, and yes, Harry again.
I have said goodbye to three pets in this blog over the past four years. We have more that will come. Logan is now 14 years old, and Paris is 10. We have one cat that is 10, Elsie, and she might outlive all of us despite having nothing to do with any of us, or maybe because of it. But we've been faithful to her all along, even through the Katrina evacuation.
But when it happens, it's a knife to the gut, twisting and turning and going in and out.
It's just what it is, and it is what will always be, until that day I like Harry will go to sleep and wake in a land where there are no more darn tears.
Rest well, dear, sweet, Harry. At least for a spell, till we are joined again.
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