Kitty

I am taking Kitty to be put to sleep in the morning.
She never had a name, other than - Kitty.
I wasn't nice to her.
Sometimes I'd talk to her though, when she'd sit on the edge of the tub while I was bathing.
And I loved the way she licked my newborn baby's hair into a DQ swirl.

Sophie got kitty for her 6th birthday

After gymnastics I took Sophie to Wendy's for a frosty.
We sat in the parking lot and watched the sunset.
As I watched her joyfully sucking on her straw, I wished there was some way I didn't have to tell her.
I let her sit next to me in the front seat.
I tell her as we drive.
"Sof, I gotta talk to you about something."
"Mom, you're freaking me out...like it's serious or something."
"It is serious.  Sof.  Kitty is sick."

Panic instantly added to her voice,
"No! no...no...no..what's going to happen."
Her fear is thick in the car.
"Well, her kidneys don't work anymore, and the vet can't help her."
I am a 6 foot tall adolescent boy trying to dance in size 13 feet.
This isn't going well.  I have no good words.
So I just start crying with her.
"I know," I say, "I know."
"I don't want Kitty to go!"
She just kept saying it over and over,
"I don't want Kitty to go."
The same phrase in all different colors and intensities.
Her face is contorted and beautiful.  She has no problem letting the grief pour out of her in heaves.
I will never forget her tiny body in gold gym leotard, with arms wrapped around it.
She is showing me, right now, the power of life.
I see it, and I cannot stop crying with her.
We have cried all night.
She made Kitty a goodbye box full of trinkets and a toy mouse.
She wrote her a poem and read it out loud to me.
She promptly wadded a blue fleece blanket into Kitty's basket and gently laid her there.
She hung a Christmas bell from the handle.
She sat with the basket in her lap, petting kitty with gentle hands.
We prayed, and thanked God for letting Ktty be with us.
Then we blew our noses.
I left a roll of toilet paper by her bed, just in case she wasn't done crying.

I am writing this now, because I don't want to forget...how effortlessly honest and beautiful Sophie is.