R.I.P. Fred

Portrait of Fred by Hugh Harris West

I've never had to euthanize a pet until today, and it's hard.  We got back to Valdosta last night, and it was immediately obvious that Fred the Cat had deteriorated.  Shirley Crowder, who helps me, feeds her, and Mary, my daughter-in-law, comes by when Shirley can't, and they both have been concerned lately.

I wouldn't be surprised to learn that Fred was 20 years old.  She was a stray that took up at our house years ago, and when I finally decided we were stuck with her and took her in for shots in 2004, they said she was  an older cat, maybe 8 or 10.  I'd been calling her Fred for a year by then, thinking she was a tomcat, and when the vet told me he was a she, it was too late to start calling her something else.

Today she looked thin, bedraggled, was unable to control her bodily functions, and was barely able to eat or walk, and  appeared to be in pain.  When I called her, she hid under the sofa on the porch.  She must have sensed something was up. I lured her out with a piece of meat and drove her in her pet carrier to the vet, with her meowing and me crying all the way. When they brought her towel-wrapped body back to the car for me, they said she had been in bad shape, and that I had done the humane thing, but still...

I buried her in the backyard by Teddy the chihuahua, with Mama's statue of Francis of Assisi standing watch.