Requiem for a Boney Old Cat.

I buried my cat illegaly in a conservation area today. Tough noogies, the kids need a special place. Maybe I do too.
I spent some time hugging the kids today, hugging my wife, wiping a lot of tears.
When everybody was rational again, when they hysterics had finished I said to Janet "I'm going out for a bit." and she said "...okay." and I said "I'm not a hugger, I'm a go-er away-er." by way of explanation, which she finally understands after 11 years.
11 years incidentally, is the time that I've known the Boney Old Cat of the title, Itchy. I suppose it would be more correct to say that was the time that I knew him, past tense. Funny how that changes so fast.
I drove for a bit and decided I didn't want to drive. Now I'm low profile incognito in a coffee shop. Surrounding me is that cacophony of sound, that fluid, rippling babble of background conversation that I find so calming in coffee shops. Much like the soothing influence of a stream, but with the option of dropping in and out of the flow. I'm having an Iced Vietnamese Coffee. First time I've ever had one. A slurpee would have been better.
Itchy was a majestic cat. He stomped on the terra. Eyes like etched jade, reminisces of his sabertooth bloodline glinting when ever he cracked open his jaws to yawn.
There are cats in this world that people are immediately drawn too, cats that are cute and fluffy and adorable. Itchy, despite the cutesy moniker, was not such a cat.
Itchy danced to an inner rhythm of violence and bloodlust. His glance held the cold indifference of a great white shark before the strike. One instantly feared Itchy. He approached with confidence, moves like a jaguar, pronounced with a South American accent yet, yeah, he was that Jaguar-y. All of this predatory presence, this animal antagonism, betrayed his true nature, which was that of a kitten before it learns to scratch.
My girls were crying tonight over the loss of the oldest cat in the house, the cat I was fond of referring to as "old man" and "old dog". I told them to remember him, and learn from him the things that they could. Like to take hugs when they need them, rather than wait for one to come along. Itchy didn't wait for affection. He seized it, and when denied he persisted, and when rejected he was undaunted. No one entered our home without eventually succumbing to having this cat, part Maine Coon, part stuffed animal, part Egyptian icon pin them to our couch and nuzzle under their chins.
A girl just sat down with her friends across from me. On the back of her t-shirt it says "Class of O8 Forever Young". Well...not forever sister.
Janet came by Itchy's acquaintance when an acquaintance of hers was planning to get rid of him. He was a foundling, a little kitten that was still being bottle fed, and the person Janet got him from discovered there were allergies in the house. So Janet took him in.
We used to take Itchy for walks in the park. He'd sprint from one bush to the next, displaying that healthy sort of 'just in case' paranoia that endeared us to one another instantly.
Itchy was the shit people. He rotated through the house throughout the night, sleeping at the heads of each of us, children included at different points. He could bite and he could scratch when he wanted to. When he bit it would leave a bruise for days. When he scratched, by God you had been scratched by a claw that Siegfried and Roy could appreciate.
But he never bit the kids, never scratched them. He had an appreciation for the delicacy and fragility of childhood.
I remember the worst I was ever scratched. I had a great white Lincoln, 1979, 2 doors, a machine as long and as quick as a torpedo boat. We were moving to Edmonton, and I drove the Lincoln, with Itchy in a box. Getting him into the box had been a test. It was amazing how strong he was. He pushed so hard against the lid that I had to use body weight to overcome him. In the car he slept, until about half an hour outside of Edmonton. It started with meowing, although the connotations of 'meow' really don't do the throaty 'rowr' of Itchy justice. The box started to jump and move on the seat beside me. I put my hand on the lid trying to keep it down, and he kept throwing his weight against it, with increasing fury. One would have thought it to be a muscular chimp, or an enraged zombie dwarf in the box, rather than just a simple housecat. Finally he escaped, tearing the box to shreds, part of my arms in the process. Itchy did not like cars, even luxurious pinnacles of 70s engineering. After that he didn't like boxes either.
This is part of why tonight was so disheartening. Over the course of his illness Itchy's condition deteriorated. He grew skinnier and skinnier, weaker and weaker. This morning he had trouble walking. I said goodbye to him this morning, got down on the floor with him and gave him a scratch behind the ears. He managed a quiet purr, but it started his chest heaving. At the door I told Janet that it felt like I might not see him again. He felt the breeze from the door, and came stumbling up. He used to make a break for it whenever the door opened. Today we were going to let him out, but he just flopped down at the doorsill, his head hanging over the step, and he watched me leave.
And that was the last time I saw him alive. Janet called me at work, sobbing, partially unintelligible, "can you come home please?" and I asked "Is he gone?" and she said "yes."
So tonight I took Itchy to a beautiful spot and I buried him. I asked the kids if they wanted to help me, or if they wanted to come to the spot after I'd covered up his grave, and they said after. I borrowed a spade from the neighbour, and threw it in the jeep. I put Itchy in a box, and there was no fight, no drama, I just laid him softly on his favorite blanket, and I picked up the box, closed the lid, and took it to the truck. Again there was no scratching, no yowling, no great and terrible beast trying to shred it's cage and any living thing in said cage's proximity. There was just this light lifeless weight sliding around inside, like a doll sliding around in the box you're allowed to guess at on the night before xmas.
We got out to the country and I dug a hole near some trees with the sun going down, in a place where rabbits and deer and birds and sunshine and long grasses breathe life and love and beauty and peace. And when the hole was dug, I took the cat out of the box, laid the blanket in the hole, tucked him in, and covered him up with dirt, and a few heavy stones to keep the wildlife away. Then I tore the box to shreds for Itchy's sake.
Here's a tip people. Don't write about burying the dead cat you were really close to when you're sitting in a coffee shop.