for Eliza Jane 2002-2015

I have a blog calendar, and I typically plan my posts, or at least my topics, well in advance. I’ve had the “cats and weddings” topic from Tuesday on the calendar for at least several months (you can actually see the post-it on the calendar in “(Not Too) Much A-Do About Being”), even though I wasn’t sure exactly what direction the post would take until I worked it up last week. The timing, as it turns out, was either terribly perfect or perfectly terrible, because today, I lost my beautiful Eliza Jane.

I’d planned to write about something else for today’s post. And I cannot, at this juncture, be anything approaching eloquent on the subject of her loss. But to post about anything else feels disingenuous, and she taught me so much about love and life that writing seems the best way to honor her.

My Liza

Eliza Jane is the only cat I raised from a kitten. She came to me under coercion: a stray calico took up residence in my parents’ storage shed and gave birth to a litter. Eliza was the only black-and-white kitten, and I already had tuxedo cat Roscoe. My mother informed me Roscoe needed a friend, so the Holstein kitten with the half-mustache and perpetually startled expression would be mine.

Eliza snuggling Roscoe after a biopsy in 2009

Roscoe adapted pretty quickly. Eliza loved to snuggle with him, even after she grew too big for both of them to fit comfortably in one bed. As a tiny kitten she would hang out on my shoulder for short stretches, but she was never much for being held. She’d sit next to me, on rare occasions in my lap, but she was always more aloof and independent than her big brother. And feisty—she earned herself a star on her chart at the vet, and it was not for good behavior.

Eliza was the only cat I’ve ever known who played fetch. It was almost unbearably cute to watch after my mom bought her a kitty toy football. Touchdown! Continue reading →