Darby L.B. Cat - just plain the greatest cat ever
Yesterday was perhaps one of the most painful days of my life. Out of nowhere, David and I were forced to make the heart-wrenching decision to say good-bye to our Darby. It was so sudden and my heart is breaking all over again as I type this. Darby was fine and healthy just a week ago but by late Sunday we noticed he wasn’t asking for his dinner. Monday he still didn’t eat anything. Or Tuesday. Wednesday, we decided to take the little guy in to see the Vet. By Thursday, the news wasn’t good for him. His kidneys were failing, a baffling condition for a indoor kitty only 8 years old. We were told that treatment could possibly make him feel better but there was no cure for him - these 3 days had done irreversible damage to his system. They never came out and said what David and I knew we had to think about. We cried for the first time Thursday night. I just didn’t understand how this could be happening….Darby hadn’t been sick a day in his life. His a big, robust cat - how, how, how could this be happening??Some things we can say about Darby:
Darby loved affection but only if his four feet were on the ground. He was definitely not a lap cat and was frightened of the duvet or any non-stable surface for that matter. But he did have an extreme weakness for paper products. So David, with the utmost perseverance, set out to condition Darby to lay on his chest. He went about this in stages - very methodically - and his stages all revolved around the phrase that I quickly decided sounded quite disturbing and deserved enormous chiding, “do you want to nuzzle my book?”. Darby would jump on the bed at night while David was reading and David cleverly thought that his book could be used to entice the little skittish one closer and closer to his chest. Sure enough, David scored a few small victories. Every once in a great while Darby would put all four paws on David’s chest and kind of almost relax enough to maybe be considered lying down before he realized, “whoa, they tricked me - get me the fuck off of here” and he’d be gone in a flash.
Darby was rescued from the SPCA in 1999. Boy, isn’t that the saddest and most definite way to come home with a kitty to go look at them all tucked up in their cages - desperately wanting homes and families. Darby, I think, knew the competition was stiff and he worked out a game-plan. Instead of cowering at the back of his cage, he’d get right up to the front and the next time a couple walked by, he’d stick his paw right out the cage and beckon them over. Bingo. Worked like a charm. The next day, we had ourselves a cat.
Over the years Darby acquired many talents. He was a world-champion boxer, had a beautiful, flawless soft roll, and he played the drums. He could also push his water bowl all the way across the kitchen floor and was a master at catching and delivering to our bedside small fuchsia-colored birdies made of feathers.
While those things came easy to him, some things were challenging. He was in the remedial “going in and out of the cat-flap” class. Eventually he did get it but it took a lot of special attention on our part and we did almost have to get a tutor.
Of course he wasn’t always an angel. He knew - boy did he know - how to annoy us at 6am on a Saturday morning. What do you mean?? Of course that’s a reasonable breakfast hour! So let me just go around their bedroom and find something to either lick or gnaw on. I know, here’s a plastic bag - I can lick that. Or what about this cord plugged in to this electric socket?? I bet if I gnaw on this it will surely wake them up. Yah, I knew it. Wait a second, I’m being sprayed with water. Whoa, wait a bloody minute, I’ve been pushed out and the door was shut on me! I’m only getting them back for not giving me my dinner until midnight last night when they came in stinking of a bar.
He never, ever held a grudge, though. And we gave him a few reasons to over the years. Camping trips, weekends away, and then the big one. 3 months away. Darby, however, was very cool and wonderfully adaptable. He took to his temporary home and family, Kristin and Gary, and had a great adventure of his own. And when we came home after 3 months and disrupted the good thing he had going with K&G, he went with it. “So, you’re home, huh?” He was a good boy.
He was in our lives almost as long as David and I have been in each other’s lives and I foolishly thought he always would be. I thought he’d live forever - he would just always be with us. His personality was huge, he was one of us, a part of our family. He’d watch TV with us, listen to music with us - jazz was his favorite. It would really chill him out. He followed us around just to be with us. He was quirky and eccentric and everyone who walked through our door fell in love with him. He was just very cool.
I think he enjoyed his life. Summer was his favorite - he loved all the open windows and his ultimate bliss was our balcony. He’d bask in the sun and put his nose right up to smell all that fresh air. If only he could break free from those walls and catch a real bird! He had his special chair that allowed him to peer out through the railing. He’d sit there for hours just looking out. He was so happy.
We knew what we had to do when we woke up Friday morning. As if giving us a gift, Darby enjoyed his last morning with us in all his favorite, normal ways. He came out of hiding to join us around his food bowl in the kitchen. He didn’t eat anything but he circled around our legs like he usually did, then sat down and looked up at us with his one little paw lifted up and bent in his suave, casual stance. He followed us out to the balcony and sat in his special chair. He smelled the fresh air and had the sun on him - thank you Mr. Weather for giving us such a beautiful, sunny day in mid-October. Later that morning, he did it one more time for me. He saw his own reflection in his water bowl and he batted at it. Oh, Darby.
But even though he looked normal, we knew inside he wasn’t and the time had come for David to make the call. When we were issued an official time to bring the little guy in, David and I just sobbed. Sobbed from our hearts breaking into tiny, little pieces.
We didn’t stay with him. We took him in, gave him all the love and kisses we could possibly give him, told him how much we loved him, kissed him again and we said good-bye.
That’s the best we could do. Our little guy - our little Darby - will be with us forever and ever. They can’t all live forever, I know that in my logical mind. But, I sure am glad that we’re about to go away for a year. Maybe when we get back, this pain in my heart will have healed.