where we got her. her early years. travel. incidents. likes. dislikes. her final couple days. finding her. josh calling right then. talking to anne. renting a car, the perfect basket casket. sitting with her. candles. the sunset. sebastopol. the spot. the horses. the pall bearers. breaking ground. sharing digging duties. the burial. the covering the grave with grass. the candles. the moonlight. the breath. the song. the return. the jameson. the perfection. the love. the LOVE.
my dear friend jesse and i shared an apartment for the fall semester of my junior year of college, before i moved to scotland. one day he came home and asked me if i wanted a kitten. i'm not sure what my *exact* words were, but i'm pretty sure they were along the lines of 'HELL YEAH!' and i may have squealed a little. he'll have to tell you the story of where he found her, but he brought her home and i think i was at school or something, so when i came home, there was a little champagne-colored, stripey kitten in our house. she was maybe 3 months old when we got her.
and tiny. she was the runt. and she stayed tiny. til i left for scotland and she became big mama while i was away.
i loved the jazz cafe recording of charles mingus playing the song 'fables of faubus'. it's SO good. the album version is painfully slow, but the live one is funkier and livelier and way better. jesse liked charles mingus as well, so i decided, we decided, to name our new kitten 'mingus'.
she'd climb on our screens and lick the water off my legs when i got out of the shower and chase me around when my feet were bare and try to bite the tops of them. she bit nate's feet, sometimes crawling under the covers to do it. when the bathroom door was closed, she'd reach under there and all i'd see was a tiny, white-booted kitten paw reaching up the door, patting around, looking for a way in (like the alien in the pantry in 'signs').
jesse litter box trained her and was the disciplinarian which was much needed. she had a gentleman caller cat who'd woo her through our glass-paneled back door. he was much too old for her. i tried to train her to walk on a leash, but she was an independent kitty and was having none of it.
my amazing, loving and supportive parents agreed to take care of her for the months i was away studying in glasgow. (jesse and i had decided that she was my cat at this point) i left them with a tiny, sweet, scared, lovely kitten and returned to a full grown and rather full-bodied cat. she went through heat while i was gone. i don't know why we didn't spay her before this, but my parents had to do it. my dad would recreate her unsettling vocals for me over the phone. sometimes i could hear her in the background.
my friend robert flew down to drive back to washington with mingus and i, and do we have some stories. i'll let him tell you about it.
mingus was with me when nate died and let me hug her. she moved with me into my tiny, messy, cluttered house behind my friends' house after graduation. to seattle into a basement apartment with gabe where we later adopted a pregnant astrud and mingus' life was never the same after egon was born on our bed. we lived happily in 3 different spots in seattle, the girls endured the drive back to colorado where we moved into mom and dad's basement, and they endured the drive out to california, living under a bathtub in sebastopol, then in squalor on valencia street, then noe valley briefly, then back to sebastopol in melissa's art studio and in the tall grass of the backyard/pole bangers field.
mingus LOVED being outside. she loved it. she'd go straight for the nearest, greenest grass and eat as much of it as her little kitty belly could hold.
she didn't like me to touch her belly. or her paws. she'd let me hold her sometimes. she'd let me pet her, but she'd bite me after a while. playfully and lovingly, but bites. sometimes hurt and annoyed more than other times.
she had dandruff and infected anal glands. she was overweight and had a heart murmur. but she was sassy. and lazy. and affectionate. and loving. especially loving on her final two days.
she loved drinking out of the sink, or just jumping up there so i'd scratch her.
she loved being brushed and then turning around to bite the bristles and chew on her extracted fur. she liked to smell my breath and would give me little kitty kisses if it smelled good enough. only after ice cream or yogurt usually. wednesday night i said goodnight to her and let her smell my breath after eating the last of my smoked gouda. no kisses.
she wasn't a great traveller, and she didn't like dogs. or vacuums. or being on a diet.
she loved sneaking under my quilt and laying in her little bean-shape under there for hours and hours. before i lofted my bed, she'd crawl under the blankets with me. she loved the bed.
and she loved me. a lot, i think.
wednesday night, i bid her goodnight with some scratches and pets, a head butt and some gouda breath.
thursday morning i lingered in bed for longer than usual. egon was yelling at me from below. she's always yelling at me in the mornings because she's hungry for breakfast and attention. i peaked over the foot-edge of my bed (which is 6 ft. in the air) said hello to egon who was looking at me from the floor, and hello to mingus who was in her bed on the chair directly below me, head and right leg hanging over the edge. i said her name. she didn't stir. i think i knew right then. i climbed down the ladder and said her name louder. touched her side, shook her bed, saw that she wasn't breathing. mingus is dead, i thought to myself. totally matter-of-factly and without emotion. whoa. then the hysterics started in. right as josh called. i've been thinking about this today, and it must've been intense to hear me answer the phone like i did. i tried to explain what had happened. i couldn't talk that well through the shocked and stifled sobs. somehow i got it out that mingus had died. i hung up. fed egon. washed my face and called him back. i asked him if he could come over. i think he said 'of course'.
i didn't know what to do. what do you do? she hadn't been to the vet out here, yet. i took them in colorado before we left and was planning on taking them soon since they'd just had fleas and probably have worms.
do i call the spca and schedule a necropsy? the thought of it was just too terrible. transporting her around, dealing with vets and clinics and yuck. i called my sister and sobbed some more to her. i texted melissa and jesse. melissa called and i sobbed some more to HER. she offered up an idea that'd i'd had earlier: we bring her up to sebastopol and find a nice, secluded spot around the property somewhere, out beyond the horses. i really loved this idea. we hung up and i just sat on the floor, eye level with mingus' squinting eye, staring down at the floor. i sat with her and cried. usually i'll drive to the bart station to pick up josh, but i couldn't leave her.
i sat calmly and quietly on the floor, sometimes touching her extended arm and holding her paw, something she'd NEVER let me do in life.
as soon as josh came up the driveway, and basil became excited, i lost it. he came into more hysterics and sobs, snot and tears. he let me cry as much as i needed to and just held me. once i'd gathered myself, he began to make arrangements. for a car, (i haven't taught him to drive el fuego. YET) for a vessel in which to transport and bury her, to confirm that my meeting at school was cancelled, for lunch, for anything i needed. my roommate caro came home from work to give me a warm hug and offer kind words and any help she could, which was so sweet and appreciated. we all talked about it, it was nice to have support in my decision not to take her anywhere for examination, but to bury her in a place that she loved with those to whom i'm so close and who knew and loved her.
they left and i sat. sometimes with egon, sometimes alone. caro's cat simon came in to pay his respects and sniff mingus and try to engage her gaze. it was so sweet and so sad.
i sent many texts. i received many texts. i tried to gather things for the trip and clear things away from her so that it would be easier to move her. i took some pictures, which have really come in handy today because it's SO surreal and unbelievable. i lit some candles. i sat. i cried. and cried. and sat. and cried.
the vessel that josh found was a lovely grey basket with a lid. i was concerned that with her arm extended like it was, it might be harder to fit her in anything. after we ate lunch, it was time to get everything together and head north. by this point it was already 4. traffic would be heavy and it would be getting dark.
initially i'd wanted to help josh place her in the basket, but i couldn't. i lost it. he gently insisted i leave the room while he got her situated inside. which was really wonderful of him, i think.
i didn't want her to be moved out of her little bowl-bed and wanted to include the blanket it was on to put under and fold over her. everything fit so perfectly, i still can't get over it.
we loaded the basket casket into the hatchback of the prius kitty hearse, placed some purple daisies on top and headed out.
as we drove out of the city, the sun was setting. it was a pale orange, dappled with white clouds. orange like mingus. the drive felt really long due to how quickly it became so dark. we arrived to smiling, tired, saddened melissa and jesse. i took them up on the offer of some jameson immediately. oh yes please. we relaxed for a second, i tried not to cry a lot, there was macaroni and cheese and snuggles and laughter and a decision on where we'd go.
we geared up in coats and hats and rubber boots, my pockets bulging with candles. melissa and i served as pall-bearers with jesse leading the way with a pickaxe in hand and josh bringing up the rear with a shovel. i told melissa 'i can't believe what we're doing'. 'i know' she said.
we walked through the apple orchard and up the wide path to the pond. the moonlight was so bright and the overcast clouds thin enough that we didn't need the flashlight.
i walked with my head down, tears streaming, throat closing. melissa got my attention and i looked past her to see one of the two horses that live along the path was standing motionless and silent, watching us walk. as soon as i turned my head and looked at him, he quickly trotted away, but it felt like the horses could feel it and knew that a sadness had occurred.
once we'd gotten past the horses to some taller grass and a wide path, near the pond and by a small round tree, jesse suggested it would be a good spot.
the three of us stood watching as jesse broke through the top layer of grass and rocks and soil with his...pick axe? yep. just looked up what that was. that's just what he had. it made such a dull thud, and the blows were powerful enough to move the earth under it, as well as rumble the earth below our feet. it was beautiful to watch. and hear. and feel. and strange. once the earth was loosened enough, the shovel came in. jesse dug first. then melissa. then me. then josh. the earth was damp and heavy but smelled so sweet and rich.
i kept thinking that i couldn't believe what we were doing. not only that it was a surreal act to be engaged in, but also that it was SO beautiful and perfect. nice to be outside in the moonlight and to be all together.
we all too two turns digging, placed the basket in the grave, took it out to even the floor of the grave, and replaced the basket.
we all crouched down. i said some things to her and cried a lot. melissa and jesse said some things. i cried a lot. josh kept his hand firmly on my back. after a little bit of staring at the basket in the grave, we each took a hand full of earth to throw on the basket.
kneeling down, jesse with a shovel, the rest of us with bare hands, we filled the grave, pushing the damp earth into the grave. that part was really satisfying and sad and surreal.
melissa said 'let's pick some grass to lay on top and finish it off'. so we did. as the boys finished filling it in, we picked long blades of grass, which was maybe more of a dried reed.
we laid those on the grave.
we lit the 5 candles we'd brought, each of us holding one, and one going on the grave. we stood with our breath swirling in mist in the candle light. melissa and i sang 'for the beauty of the earth'. we stood for a minute. i bent down to say goodbye and blow out mingus' candle.
we walked back, by the horses, through the orchard, with our candles lit.
it was the most beautiful funeral. and i think she would have found it most satisfactory.
it's now been a week since she died. today is friday, the day after thanksgiving. i dreamt of her a couple days ago. i was in a hotel lobby fumbling with some stuff, barefoot, looking for my room, and mingus trots over. tail held high, looking so bright eyed and happy. and thin. svelte even. she looked really happy and lively and she walked right over to me, trotted over, really and nuzzled me and let me pet her.
it was wonderful. i am grateful that she came to tell me that she is ok, happy even and that her spirit is forever entangled with mine.
though the death of mingus was beautiful and perfect and generous and loving of her to leave the way she did, the loss of her continues to be profound.
as my dear friend jane said 'you will never be a meredith who never had a mingus'.
thank god for that.
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