Monday, September 7, 2009

Neck And Neck

This is a memory.

Neck And Neck

When I got sober,
just a couple months of dry,
getting on the ground,
I was still looking for work.
Our ginger cat,
we called him Godot
or we called him The Best Cat
In The World, he died
over a few days
of kidney failure. One day
I held him. Springtime
in the sun. He smiled.
Grief and joy raced neck and neck.
Then I put him down.

February 10, 2009 4:54 PM
********

How this worked, I was laid off in November, received the ultimatum in the last days of December, struggled against the idea but capitulated by the end of January and went to treatment. February, 1983, I was in treatment. I got out in March. I looked for work in March and April, went on an interview in early May and went to work for the company the next ten years.

At the same time, Godot began to fail with all the typical signs of kidney failure in cats. By the beginning of May he was sinking into coma, hardly rousing at all but for a few moments a day. Finally he stopped everything. On that last day, I sat with him in the sun, knowing it was time, but also knowing he liked it just fine in my lap in the sun. Phew, tough to write still after all these years. I looked around at the spring, at the life, the beauty and a joy rose in my heart right along with the grief that was breaking my heart. I was so proud to be there, to be present, to be able to do what had to be done.

The next morning I took him to my vet, who by this time and so many cats was a friend, and I stood beside the best cat in the world as we put him down. That tore my heart wide open of course. I drove home after and straight to an AA meeting where I found I could not speak, though I tried, the grief was so large.

That was a Thursday. It was the next day, a Friday that I was invited to join that company where I started working in my new sobriety and then kept that job for ten years. I felt really grateful that I had finished with Godot first.

It was the first time in my life that I learned I could have such disparate emotions as big grief and fierce joy in my heart simultaneously, simply amazing.

13 comments:

  1. {christopher} Death is much on my mind. You know I lost my cat this summer. Then last night, my only uncle died after being a constant in my life for my 56 years. I worry about my dad, who lost his younger brother. I know it's life. But it sucks sometimes.

    ReplyDelete
  2. ....
    VLADIMIR:
    You should have been a poet.
    ESTRAGON:
    I was. (Gesture towards his rags.) Isn't that obvious?
    Silence.
    VLADIMIR:
    Where was I . . . How's your foot?
    ESTRAGON:
    Swelling visibly.
    VLADIMIR:
    Ah yes, the two thieves. Do you remember the story?
    ESTRAGON:
    No.
    VLADIMIR:
    Shall I tell it to you?
    ESTRAGON:
    No.
    VLADIMIR:
    It'll pass the time. Two thieves, crucified at the same time as our Saviour. One—
    ESTRAGON:
    Our what?
    VLADIMIR:
    Our Saviour. Two thieves. One is supposed to have been saved and the other . . . (he searches for the contrary of saved) . . . damned.
    ESTRAGON:
    Saved from what?
    VLADIMIR:
    Hell.
    ESTRAGON:
    I'm going.
    He does not move.
    VLADIMIR:
    And yet . . . (pause) . . . how is it –this is not boring you I hope– how is it that of the four Evangelists only one speaks of a thief being saved. The four of them were there –or thereabouts– and only one speaks of a thief being saved. (Pause.) Come on, Gogo, return the ball, can't you, once in a way?
    ESTRAGON:
    (with exaggerated enthusiasm). I find this really most extraordinarily interesting.
    VLADIMIR:
    One out of four. Of the other three, two don't mention any thieves at all and the third says that both of them abused him.
    ESTRAGON:
    Who?
    VLADIMIR:
    What?
    ESTRAGON:
    What's all this about? Abused who?
    VLADIMIR:
    The Saviour.
    ESTRAGON:
    Why?
    VLADIMIR:
    Because he wouldn't save them.
    ESTRAGON:
    From hell?
    VLADIMIR:
    Imbecile! From death.
    ESTRAGON:
    I thought you said hell.
    VLADIMIR:
    From death, from death.
    ESTRAGON:
    Well what of it? ....

    Waiting for Godot
    Samuel Beckett

    ReplyDelete
  3. Karen, I have found each grief when it stands alone is bearable and clear, and that when the griefs entangle as they often do, they are still bearable if I am clear enough, but that when I am distracted, defensive, confused and the griefs are knotted up, then things get pretty difficult. Underneath difficult grief that is no longer fresh one finds some form of fear or other anguish that is not grief.

    When grief is fresh, however, it levels me, lays me out raw without skin on. That is as it should be, for its season.

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  4. So sad, Christopher, yet such joy, too! Congratulations on your sobriety. I'm an adult child of alcoholics myself although I don't drink.

    My nephew (a big strapping police officer in Austin, TX) had to have his beloved 8 years young Siamese cat put down last week due to sudden kidney failure and my sister called me and said he cried like a baby all week. Our pets are our teachers, guides, and friends. People without pets just don't get it. When my 20 year old cat died naturally, I was prepared because he'd been fading for several months. But that day he waited for me to come home from work, then lay on his favorite sunbeam on my foot stool and I petted him and told him it was okay to go. He died almost immediately, peacefully. I was so grateful to have him for 20 years, but I still cry when I think about him. We called him "The World's Best Cat" and he was. A great post. Blessings!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ghost, my friend, my very good friend. Thank you for your passage. Finding that precise one is exquisite librarianship.

    The story of the name, Annie found this kitten, decided she wanted it and we said okay but the kitten lived in Salem while we lived in Portland. Nobody had the time for a while to get the transfer together. It was decided that we would wait, first the kitten was too young, and then for transport the just over half an hour away, one way. So we waited. And waited. He was not yet in our house and already he was named Godot, the kitten who might come.

    It was years later when he demonstrated his genius that we named him The Best Cat In The World. Once he did a victory dance for us on the porch (like a wide receiver in the end zone, or a tribal hunter) when he caught a small creature of some sort that he never let us see. Another time he paid me back sternly for teasing him. I deserved every claw mark in my back. It was exquisite if painful communication.

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  6. Marion, there it is. I brought the cats, relics of my marriage here with me when I sold that house. They were aging then. They lived here since 2001. The first one died in winter a year and a half ago, the second died a year ago, and this one just a couple months ago. The first was 22 and a half. The second nudging nineteen. The third just eighteen.

    I am without a cat for the first time since 1972. It's okay, mostly, but I have a neighborhood full of critters and that's good.

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  7. Yes. I remember that feeling/s. In fact I am living it/them.
    Still feels slightly schizophrenic to me, everytime :)
    In fact, feeling anything at all is a surprise still, some days.

    Think I will shut up now.

    xxx

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  8. great name for your cat!
    I so can relate to the loss and the sobriety piece...
    my dad and I wrestled with alcoholism for years and once we got sober, then we had more death to deal with than all the years previous ( including two beloved cats )... it's almost like I had to be ready to sit there and hurt instead of avoiding the grief ( or any emotion for that matter ) inside a bottle.
    thanks for this authentic sentiment

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  9. Thank you for sharing this story with us Christopher. Both struggles for life and when one lets go, as hard as it is, the other has been rejuvenated at a cost.
    I am very moved by "Neck and Neck".

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  10. Life and death are so intertwined aren't they? The best part of your sharing was that you were truly present for the caring ending of Godot's time on this earth and then were able to stay sober and be present in accepting a job and sticking with it and being alive.

    What a blessing that in the telling of Godot's last hours you still experience the entire surroundings.

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  11. Thank you, all. Like Michelle, I think I will be quiet at this time.

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  12. It's always awful when losing a little-furry-person-who-lives-with-you... thank you for sharing this thought.

    "Grief and joy raced neck and neck / Then I put him down." simple, beautiful, and simply beautiful.

    ReplyDelete
  13. He who has loved, has also lost. Your heart shone thru in this one. I too, have felt that joy and grief at the same time with the loss of my favorite cat...sad that he died, but happy that I was there to say goodbye.

    ReplyDelete

The chicken crossed the road. That's poultry in motion.


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