I'm honestly not sure how I can write this post. I wish I was some kind of writer who could capture the life of Hootie and our feelings about him, but only our memories give him full credit of who he was and what he meant to us.
Hootie coming to us was the definition of serendipity. Range had been missing for a while, and John suggested that Hannah go over to the battle barn (a barn across 550 in Port Matilda) to pick out a cat because, as John has always said, "every girl needs a cat". Knowing what I know now, I don't think I would ever recommend taking a "barn cat" out of a barn to live in a home, but Hootie never was a barn cat. He had been raised in a home with his two siblings, but at some point, the owner gave them to the barn owner. I can't even imagine Hootie surviving in a barn without the love of people, so it should be no surprise when Hannah showed up that he ran right to her. The deal was done. Or so we thought.
That first night, he hid behind the entertainment schrank, scared out of his mind. He was a skinny thing with the coarsest of fur. I looked at the tips of his ears with the tufts of fur and thought he looked like an owl. Hence, his name "Hoot", but we never called him that. It was Hootie from the start.
We took him to the vet just a day or two after, and we were given the bad news: he had FIV. Because it's transmissible to other cats, and since we had several at home, I told the vet that I couldn't keep him. Dr. Griffiths told me that if I would get him neutered and let him heal for a week, he would do the surgery for $50. Fine, but I wasn't keeping him.
A week later, we couldn't imagine letting him go.
And that's what Hootie was to us. I can't imagine life before him, and life without him now seems unimaginable.
He was one of those cats that comes along once or twice in a lifetime. My childhood cat, Z.T. (or Zeb) was that for me--literally the most perfect cat--and Hootie was that for Hannie and for all of us.
He never peed or pooped outside of his box.
He didn't have any cat male genitalia after being treated for crystals in his urine. Not only was the root of occasional jokes, but so was his $70/bag cat food.
He came when called.
He had a voice.
He was great with kids and people who profess to not like cats.
He loved to eat much to the chagrin of the scale.
He let Hannah dress him up in ridiculous hats.
He was the Kennedy cat ambassador.
He took up space in Hannah's newsletters from PA school, so much so that people would ask "How's Hootie?" if she didn't mention him for a while.
Selfishly, he was as much my cat as he was Hannah's. When we look back on the time spent together, I think he was with me longer than he was with her because she was gone to school or on a mission for seven years straight. But every time she came home, he ran to be with her and it was like he didn't even remember I existed. So I guess in his heart of cat hearts, he was hers.
We never knew exactly how old he was, but we guess he was between 13 and 14 when we noticed something on his nose.
He had always had a strange but small black spot on his nose that would grow a bit and would either fall off, or Hannah would pick it off. She had said a couple of times that she wondered if it was cancer. Turns out, it was. All of a sudden it started spreading up the side of his nose. He scratched at it constantly, and we worried it would cut off his air flow or affect his vision.
When we took him to the vet, the vet told us that FIV cats are prone to all kinds of cancers, but she had never seen what he had. She told us that he seemed fine at the time (which he did), but if his quality of life seemed to change, we would need to bring him in. She did reassure us that for an FIV cat, he had already beaten the odds of longevity.
We hoped that we would have him for a long while, but it didn't take long for him to start sleeping almost all of the time and to have labored breathing just climbing stairs. When we started to lose weight (something that had never been a problem for him), we knew it was time.
I don't think I've ever had a harder time showing up to put an animal down. It was a mental struggle to not just cancel the appointment and keep him for a few more days. We just couldn't imagine distinguishing the light that he was in our home.
In the most beautiful display of love, Hannah held him the entire time. She held him as he was sedated, and she held him as he passed on. I always tell my family to look up so that as the spirit leaves the body, the animals can see our faces and the tears of love on them versus the tops of our heads, but took everything to admit that he was gone and look up. She wrapped him up in what had become his favorite blanket and held him for the drive home. And we buried him in the trees where Glo had been taking him outside to give him some last "catventures".
The grief has been overwhelming. Not hearing his bell ringing around the house as left empty space in our ears and hearts. We didn't have him long enough, but I hope in the time we did have him, that he knows how much we loved him. If there's anyone we will anticipate seeing in the eternities, it will be Mr. Hoot Magoot, always ready for any event in his tuxedo.
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