I wrote this post 2 years ago. I had been writing it prior to the event as I had anticipated the inevitable. When things like this happen, I manage to translate emotions directly into written word or music as pure as they get. Without snags, forethought or doubt. My best work comes out of things like this. Sheer emotion. In this case I got a song and some writing out of it. A song called "Face the Music" and this post. One of my best literary commentaries. So here's that from 2 years ago today July 9th, 2015:

When I was six, my cat Tucker had to be put down. I loved that cat. Or as much as a six year old could. Turns out he had some sort of cancer of the ears and it was either amputate his ears, and live ear-less, or put him down. Being that we were 6 and 4 at the time, my mother had no clue how to tell us he was going away. So she took care of it as we were away at our dad’s for the weekend. I was devastated when I came back. Today I can’t remember a thing that cat did for me, other than cause the trauma of having found out he was gone at six years old.

A year or so later, we got Daisy. Daisy is an interesting case. They supposedly picked her up off the side of the road and had to operate on her. She has a bone missing from her hip (although you wouldn’t know it) and her tail was mostly amputated as they assumed she might’ve gotten run over. Affectionately we call it her “nub”, she hates when we mess with it. She was the cat of the week at the MSPCA. This was 1999. I vividly remember walking in to the cat room, and she was there in a black, two level cage, she seemed to be the only cat actually playing with the fuzz balls hanging about and she would actually approach you and play with you through the cage. We immediately fell in love and took her home that same day. A year later, we got my dog. A man’s best friend is usually a dog. I love dogs, we get along pretty well. I’ve lived with them, had them. But I consider myself a cat person. My dog seemed to latch on to my sister. By her side when she came down the stairs in the morning, waited for her during the day, and slept on her bed at night. For me, that’s Daisy. I don’t remember why she loved me more, I suppose it was that I gave her the most attention. I hung out with her. She literally was my best friend. I was ostracized from a group in middle school, and I never really had more than one or two close friends in my life now or since. So during most of my afternoons and weekends when I was too young to drive, Daisy was my buddy. She refused to leave me alone.

She was born an outdoor cat. So a huge fear of ours was her escaping and never coming back, we also once lived a stone’s throw from the highway. We made extra precaution putting the dogs out or leaving to ensure she didn’t escape. I can’t recount how many times I hear “WATCH THE CAT!” when heading out the door, my mom freaking out as we slowly backed away out the sliver we opened to slip out. Well she got out all the time. Most times we’d spend the next hour chasing her around, but sometimes, she’d bolt into the woods. We thought the worst, being right near coyote’d woods and the highway. Did she know how to survive out there? Once she was out for 3 days. She always came back. Once she even fell out of a second story window. Her downfall is individually sliced cheese. She hears the wrapping being undone and walks over meowing from under the car or bush she was under. She owned the place. She messes with the dog and they wrestle. She sits in windows and screams at the birds, the only time she ever used to meow. Every day I’d come home she’d come running. When I got my first video camera, she was one of the first things I filmed…And filmed, and filmed, and filmed. She’s the chilliest cat.

I realize most of what she does, most cats do. She has her own character though. She would never cower under a bed if someone new came in, or the dog. She would walk right up and see what you’re all about. But she’s not overbearing either like some cats. She’s massively friendly, only using claws if you deserved it. Her claws are razor fucking sharp, becoming so by sharpening them on every 2x4 and door molding she can find (mainly in the basement thank god), although she hates scratching poles for some reason. Another favorite pastime of mine would be putting nickels and quarters on the table and watch her slowly wipe them off the table, as she watches them fall off in evil amazement. I feed her ice cream off my finger in secret, the only true thing she loved (I guess the dairy). She was never a huge burden, she did more good than any other animal we’ve ever had. Writing this she seems like every bit a cat as any other non-satanic spawned feline.

But the difference was that I grew up with her. I got her when I was 7. I’m 23 now. That’s 16 LOOOONNNG years. That’s your childhood. I shared my childhood with Daisy. I had her, and she had me. She loved lying next to me in bed and it was like a security blanket most nights, feeling her walk in during the dead of night to sleep. Next to ME! I had a lot of experiences with this cat. She was there even when I didn’t know it. The smiles, the laughs, the cries, the angry parts and happy moments. I entered High School and left college with Daisy. I carry her up stairs because she gives me a look when I’d go up and down so often. She was my princess. Still is.

Daisy’s unique. She’s a calico. Her fur is all kinds of shades and colors. She has one “finger” on her paw that’s colored yellow. She’s beautiful. She goes to bite, and when she does, she puts your hand in between your teeth, and begins to lick you, as if she can’t really come to terms with hurting you. In 2010, I moved off to college. Leaving her for the first time. I didn’t miss my parents, or my room, or my sister (bleh) or even my dog. I missed my Daisy. She missed me too. She moped around, actually depressed. Every time I came home she’d perk up and act like she was mad and ignore me, then cave in and visit me. When we were a lot younger, I promised her I’d move out, take her with me, and I’d let her run around outside in the woods somewhere as free as she pleased. Very frequently I promised her this and thought about it to myself. Every year in fact, It’s the only thing I know she ever really wanted that I knew of. I moved out of school, into my apartment, thinking about it occasionally. Then I moved again and again, each time not really being able to take her given my situation. I regret I never got to fulfill that wish. Now in recent months, she’s gained a bad rash that’s worsening, her hips fail her, she hobbles up steps she once sprinted, her whiskers are falling out, even quite recently as I type this, she can no longer make it to her litter box. But worst of all, in a matter of weeks a month or two ago, she’s completely lost her vision. She’s 100% blind and only seems to see shadows. She moves by noise. It’s gut wrenching. The other day, she fell down the stairs. I wasn’t there, but others were. She’s now in a lot of pain it seems. The dogs have an aversion to her, which is worrying. She once loved the outdoors, but now she’s afraid of it. And it truly pains me to say today, at around 7pm. I held my beautiful calico, my love, my playmate, my sleeping pal, my lonely buddy, my “get the hell off the keyboard for the 20th time this hour”cat, my film study, my actress, my thoughts, my childhood friend. I held my Daisy for the last time as she quickly passed away to the great 2x4 cherry wood stained scratching post in the sky. Where instead of trees, there’s wood planks, plastic chocolate syrup caps to chase around, mice, moths, and spiders, little dogs to be dominated and cheese and ice cream to eat and lick.

She’s in a place where she is in the best shape of her life, watching the birds, running and playing, looking at whatever she wants with those gigantic, gorgeous yellow eyes of hers, getting her neck scratched when she wants it falling onto you as she succumbs to what must be the greatest feeling ever, jumping onto counters and laying on every single possible spot of sun she can find. I believe she’s wherever Skippy’s been these past 3 years and whatever she wants she has. I’m sad to say I’ll never get over her, because she wasn’t just a cat to me. She was my best friend.

I’m enormously saddened, I know she’s in a better place now, where she can see and run again. But most of all, she still has that 2 inch long nubby tail she swishes around when she’s saying “Don’t fucking touch me.”