I keep bursting into tears, I know I did the right thing, but home will not be the same without him, he was born here, he was two days old when his Mum decided that she couldn't be bothered with the constant demands, no demand feeding for my Mogwai
, she deposited her kittens on my lap, sitting on the arm of the sofa to make sure the kitten sitter was up to the job
, and then when they squeaked too much carried them all back upstairs to the drawer that the kids had pulled out of the dresser and she had given birth in. After that she would decide to deposit them on me every time she wanted a break (about 4 times a day), always looking on to make sure they were being looked after.
He was the first kitten to venture downstairs on his own, the first kitten to try to escape out of the front door, and we built a kitten enclosure downstairs in the front room, the first one to leap onto the curtains to shimmy back down and out of the enclosure. That was how he got his name, it was always "Trouble, stop doing that/Trouble get out of there/ Trouble get DOWN!!!", and it stuck. When he got older he was the most mis-named cat ever, he was a joy, even when he got an abscess on his face from another cat bite, the Vet said I'll just take him out the back to shave the fur and if you could hold him while I lance it", he purred so hard, the Vet came out with Trouble with a deflated face, saying"He just purred while I was shaving, so I thought I would try......", and he just let the Vet do what he had to sitting still and letting him get on with it. Every Vet Trouble met said that they wished they could all be like him.
Every rescue cat that I have taken in over the last almost 18 years, some have been old and lasted a few months, others a few years, Trouble just accepted them, unless they tried to become Topcat, in which case a few bops with velveted paws was enough along with his innate knowledge that HE was Topcat was enough.
That was my Baby Boy, and I am sorry if I am boring you all. I do believe that for the first time in my life I have actually written a eulogy for a cat.
Thank you all for your support, it means a lot to me that other people understand that he wasn't 'just a cat'.