But instead of making this a sad time I am going to write about the good times, that I do not want to forget with the passage of time……
It was a fall day, in late September or early October of 2000. Peter and I can never agree which, but we know it was before our anniversary on October 17th. The reason I know this is that we considered BW an anniversary present. Anyway, back to the story. That day I was teaching so Peter was working by himself. He was working at a condo complex called Brookwood, hence the name BW. When he called he told me this story about the finding of BW.
He was near the entrance to the complex that faces a busy 4 lane road. At the entrance was the sign for the complex and some low deciduous bushes. It was part of the responsibly of cleaning the complex to go up to the road edge. Because of the 4 lane road, we often found dead animals. Peter was walking up to the entrance when he saw a little ball of fur. I’m sure he was dreading what animal had been hit this time, but as he got closer this ball of fur moved! This little itty bitty tiny kitten meowed at him and ran into the bushes. He set down his pail (which was an enclosed type) and raced over to the truck to call me for guidance. I gave him what advice I could and he went back out to the bushes, hoping to not find that the kitten had run out in the road. As he got closer he could see that she had crawled into his pail. He quickly scooped her up and got her back to the truck. He put her in a 5-gallon bucket and she was so small that she could not jump out. I met him at the complex and we discussed what to do with her. Suffice to say that we did keep her and when we took her to the vet she was so young (and squirmy) that the vet could not 100% determine her sex. He guessed her to be around 3 to 4 weeks old.
She was a Tortie, which is a color breed, but it is a personality breed too. Personality was something she had in abundance! She ruled the roost fairly quickly and made our other cat Mozart very happy to have a companion, even if she was crabby. She would run up behind us for no reason and bite us on the back of the leg and then take off down the hall, if a cat could laugh, she would of…..kinda that Boris and Natasha type of laugh, not a HA HA laugh. When we couldn’t find her in the house we would sing…she HATED singing or any instrument playing, found this out when she bit a student taking flute lessons.
One final story, she loved for us to scratch her back with our feet. It did not make a difference what time, day or night, when she wanted her back scratched she wanted it NOW. She would just flop on the floor in front of you and give you this look as if to say….”Well, what are you waiting for??” As the days pass I’m sure other memories will flood our heads of the good times we had for the past 16 years.
If the Lord tarries on His return for His children, we will join BW on that hillside overlooking the pond that is so beautiful in the spring and summer with all of the butterfly bushes in the fall with the spectacular foliage and in the winter with the quiet stillness of a new blanket of snow.
BW you were loved, rest easy little girl, we will miss you.