…and this is the only video I have of him. I know it’s just a promotional video for the locket, but that and a lot of still photos…and the locket…are all I have left of him. And his ashes, when we get them back.

I had only recently gotten the video camera when I made this video a few months ago, and now I wish I had taken more movies of him.

I got up to go to the bathroom early Saturday morning, and found that Mitty the Kitty had expired…believe it or not, the same place where we found the Stripecat…on the bathroom floor, on the rug in front of the toilet. At first I thought he was just sleeping, but when I reached down to pet him, he didn’t move. I picked him up…his eyes were open, but weren’t reacting. He was most definitely gone.

Mitty has always been “my” cat….he decided this a little over 14 years ago when I adopted him and his sister, Dusty, as little kittens. Mitty almost died before his first Christmas, when he ate tinsel off the Christmas tree, and it got stuck inside him and caused problems. The vet could try surgery, but it could be risky, he said.

I cried the whole night when Mitty stayed over at the vet’s. But I was so happy when I got a call the next day saying that the tinsel had been gacked up. They were giving him some kind of fluid which helped him to pass it. They saved the clumps of tinsel that he gacked up, and it was a LOT.

Mitty got to come home that day, and he was soon back to his robust self. And in all of these years, he’s never had any other serious health problems. As he aged, he became more sedate and less kitten-like, but that is to be expected.

Mitty hated the Stripecat, and vice-versa. Mitty tried to kill Stripes when he first came here, malnourished and with a sprained paw. I had to keep them separated for a while, until Stripes regained his health. After that, they would get into some knock-down, drag-out fights, where the fur was literally flying, and they both had their share of war wounds, mostly in the form of scratches on the face. As both cats grew older, though, the animosity slowed down to where, if they passed each other, there’d be some hissing and growling, and that would be the end of it.

Did Mitty die of grief…did he realize how much he missed his “enemy” of many years? Why was it that he was found in the exact same place, and almost the exact same position, as we’d found the Stripecat a few weeks ago? They were here together for around eleven years, which is a lot longer for a cat than it is for a human.

Or maybe he just got old and died naturally, in his sleep. We’ll likely never know for sure.

Mitty has been my best friend for a little over 14 years. He’s been there for me through a failed marriage…once the ex accused me of loving Mitty more than I loved him. I told him he was probably right…at least Mitty always loved me for who I am, and never gave me any shit like he did. Mitty never liked that guy very much, anyway.

Mitty always seemed to know when I wasn’t feeling well, or was sad. He’d always come to me and try to make me feel better. Even when I was sick last week, he was there for me.

He was always afraid of strangers. He also hated everyone in my ex’s family (smart cat!). When I first met Mike and he came over for the first time, I warned him that Mitty would probably run and hide from him. Imagine my surprise when he just walked right up to where Mike was sitting, and jumped into his lap! Maybe it was his way of telling me, “Mommy, this is a good one…keep him around!” Who was I to argue?

Mitty hardly ever meowed. But he had the most expressive green eyes…every time he looked at me, I could see the love he had for me in them. He used to hang out by the table when Mike and I were eating, and just sit down on the floor and make what I called “adoring greens” at me. And if I was eating something that he might like, such as chicken or fish, and it wasn’t too spicy or anything, I’d cut off a small piece and give it to him. Not too much, though…around here, human food is reserved as a special treat for cats. Every Thanksgiving, they all get some turkey and gravy in their dishes. But a little bit doesn’t really hurt anything. Mitty was so good at playing the eyes thing, I could almost never refuse him when he looked at me that way. Sometimes I had to, when I knew that what I was eating wasn’t good for him.

Long ago, I made up a little song…”I am wanting of Mitty…and Mitty is wanting of me!” almost always, when I sang it, he’d come to me. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve sang it between Saturday morning and now, and no Mitty was forthcoming.

He also understood “where’s my kiss?”, although he didn’t feel like cooperating for the video. He did come back to get kisses after the video was done, though. Typical cat! Usually, when I asked for my kiss, and made the kissy noises, I’d get some serious headbutts in the face, accompanied by loud purring. He was giving me my kisses just about to the end.

So this is why I wasn’t sure I even wanted to go to the beer festival. I thought I was feeling well enough to withstand it. But getting up and finding that your best friend of 14 years has passed away, with no warning…it sort of put me into a relapse. I was throwing up again, even when there was nothing there to gack up.

I eventually decided that I needed to get the hell out of here, and since it was by this time too late to cancel the hotel and get any money back, we’d go up to Portland, anyway. As for the beer festival…I was taking a “wait & see” on that one, knowing that I could easily re-sell the tickets to the sold-out event if I had to. There were a few people on the Maine Craigslist looking for tickets, I could contact one of them if I didn’t want to go. The important thing was just to get out of the house.

And getting out DID help. Mike said that I should not feel guilty over feeling better and wanting to do something fun…it would not bring Mitty back, and perhaps he would have wanted me to be happy instead of sad. He always worried about you when you weren’t feeling well, remember?

So we did go to the beer festival, and had a good time…for the most part. I have a rant about the “least” part for later.

Now we’re home, and I’m back to getting used to the fact that Mitty is not here. I keep turning around to look for him, but I will never see him again.

Farewell, best friend. I hope you are up at Rainbow Bridge, with Mister Bill, Lucky, Squeaker, and Stripecat. Tell them I still love and think about them, too!

Mitty’s Catster Page