Partings

March 3rd 2017

By John W. Vander Velden

 

Oliver was just a cat…our cat.  He had been our cat for almost eleven years.  As cats go, Oliver was a good cat.

Oliver had long hair…orange fur.  He left it all over, most of the year.  Ask Jackie about how much he shed.  I used to say we could knit a cat from the fur we had to clean up.  Not that shedding was the only way he left hair in our domicile, but I won’t get in to that.  We were told that orange cats have tooth problems…Oliver did.  But it wasn’t the fur…tons of fur…it wasn’t the teeth.  In the end, it was his kidneys.

We had known for years that he had kidney problems.  Special food, which he hated, had done wonders.  But even wonders have their limits and eleven years is old for a cat.  I’m sure some of you have had cats much longer, but it’s old all the same. 

So we come once more to parting.  Anyone that has walked this earth as long as I, has had to face many partings.  Sometimes it is the parting of friends and neighbors due to relocation.  Sometimes it is the parting due to changes of employment.  Sometimes it is the purposeful separation caused by the falling out of favor.  Yes, we have all had to deal with partings and for the most part, it is painful.  Another word comes to mind but I refuse to use it even if it pounds at the inside of my skull yearning to escape.  I will hold that word prisoner for now.

Some might say I’m too soft or sensitive for my own good to allow the death of a cat to remind me of other painful separations.  But Oliver was a good cat, within the limits of what a cat can be.  He had been part of our household for years.  He will be missed.  And that’s the point, isn’t it.  We miss those things we lose…providing we had them in the first place…and providing they mattered.

So as I stood beside the small plot made for Oliver, I remember other good pets, Fluffy, King, Ike, and all the rest.  How they, in their time, had enriched my life, by just being the dogs or cats they were.  But my mind went to other partings…certainly more painful separations.  Like I said I have had to face many.  The ache from those times returned.  Not nearly as severe as when I endured those separations years ago.  And I am reminded how much my world was changed by those partings…then…It changed a little today.

For there are those wounds that never completely heal.  Maybe that’s a good thing.  Maybe it reminds us that we are human…that we need connections….Connections are vital to who we are…. They help to make us who we have become.  Connections are made stronger by empathy…caring about others...trying to understand others…doing our best to see their situation.  Having empathy is a good thing, but sometimes it hurts like….well, there’s that word again.

Partings remind us how bound we are to things…but much more, how we are bound to people.

I dread the thought of partings.  Yet I know that parting is part of living…or life.  Some say parting makes room for new relationships.  I figured I had room enough to add those other to the collection I already had.  But today…well today…I said good bye to an orange fluffy friend…and the parting…well…. 

 

 

 

 

(598 Words)                  3-3-2017