Yesterday this little guy walked home across the Rainbow Bridge.
I know he must have been ready to go because he went so quickly and without hardly any fuss at all.
I wasn't sure what the outcome would be when I took him to Thornwoods yesterday afternoon. I guess I was hoping the vet would be able to do something miraculous to help him get comfortably through the rest of the summer, at least.
He hasn't been well for a very long time...
On Wednesday he walked out into the yard and just stood there for a few minutes... as if he'd thought that going out there would make him feel better somehow. But when he started back towards the house I could tell that even walking for him had become such a struggle and I think that must have been the moment I realized what I was going to have to do.
I had never seen him quite that bad before.
The vet took one good look at him.. and then at me.. and said he thought we were both finally ready. We'd been down this decision making road a couple times before but there had always seemed to still be some quality of life left.
Even though he hadn't been able to jump on the bed to sleep with me for a number of years and then began having such a hard time even climbing the stairs. I had little kitty beds placed all over the house so that he'd have some comfortable places to lay down on every floor. But still his favorite place in the house was that sunny landing right at the top of the stairs... (which he always had to painstakingly climb to.)
I honestly don't know what I was feeling. I think a part of me may have been feeling relief but mostly I was in a state of denial.
I was cradling his head in my hands at the moment they gave him the shot. It had been sort of hanging off the edge of the table and I really wanted to scoot him back further to make him more comfortable, but at the same time didn't want to disturb anything. So I just held him and looked at that little face and I swear that less than 30 seconds later the vet confirmed there was no heartbeat left.
What a very sad, and yet in a way beautiful moment. He went so very peacefully after what I think may have actually been several months of who knows how much discomfort.
This was actually a shot I took of him of him laying on the cool garage floor just before I put him in his carrier. (And shoot I really, really wish I hadn't had that crazy filter set on my camera when I took this picture, because he really didn't look green like this.) :(
We got him from the Cascade Animal Hospital in September 1997. I'd always remembered it as being 1996... so all of this time I thought he was nearly 20 when in actuality he was ONLY 18. But still!
And we named him Marzipan because he was the color of honey and almonds and also because my daughter Whitney once had a stuffed animal named Marzipan that she'd loved so much that she'd picked all the fur off, so she needed more fur to pick... JK
Even though I'm sure she had a TON of fur to pick off of this black sweater afterwards...
Whitney with Marz (at a year old in 1998)
Here's Daryn with Marz shortly after we brought him home.
She loved that kitty so much! In fact she was the one to officially give him his full Christian name... Marzipan Milton Maude Vonya Milroy Moranz.
Don't ask, just smile...
And he was always such a trouper, surviving a number of accidents and maladies over the years including having his neck cut open on a barbed wire fence with ensuing stiches and a case of ring-worms that was so severe that he had to be completely shaved from head to tail!
Not to mention the traumatic day when little brother Riley came along and the terrorizing began!..
But through the years they truly became the very best of buddies and companions.
And right now I can tell that Riley misses him so much!
Daryn with Marz in 2005 (10 years ago!)
And with both of them during a visit back home in 2007.
He was always such a pretty boy!
He came to us in October at around three months old... which makes his birthday probably in July. So he was just almost exactly 18 years old...
I actually made this as a little birthday card for Whitney several years ago but it seems appropriate now as well I suppose. See what a little trouper he was? Thanks for humoring me little man! :)
I was looking for an appropriate poem to post, but you have to admit that most of the Rainbow Bridge poems are pretty darn corny (sorry)... or at least I think so. But this one works for me and somehow gives me peace.
We miss you Marz and we will always remember you!
And in our minds we can see you RUNNING home across that bridge... just as light as a bird and free as the wind!
And we know we will see you later...
