Paraphrasing
the first line of ‘A Christmas Carol,’ Puddy was alive: to begin with.
As stories
go, that is a rather spoiler-heavy revelation to throw in, right there at the outset.
But I have to be mindful. At the centre of this story there is a deceased cat. Possibly
somebody’s beloved deceased cat. I want to keep that in mind, as I tell you
about last Sunday’s rather outlandish events. I want to keep a level tone for
the poor unknown feline who lost its life out on the New Line Road.
So, to recap:
Puddy is our
adoptive stray cat of about five years. She lives a predominantly outdoor life around
the gardens and quiet streets of our housing estate. She is known to several of
the neighbours and we like to think we have a special relationship with her
because she spends her evenings in our living room and any nights she wants in
her basket in the front hall. We feed her twice a day and she has a nice pied a
terre in the garage in a straw-laden kennel, whenever she needs to have a night
out and about. Puddy pretty much sticks to the neighbourhood, picking up her
kindnesses wherever she can, but sometimes she has been known to go on a hike.
Puddy went
missing on Friday 5th September and was still missing on Sunday 14th
September. This was a long time by her standards and both Patricia and I were
concerned she had come to harm. We did all the recommended things, I patrolled
the adjoining areas, and we hoped for the best. By Friday the 12th,
I was covertly watching the Social Medias for advice on cats found dead on our
local roads. There was one such advisory late on that Friday night and I drove out to see but
it wasn’t Puddy.
On last Sunday morning, which would have been the 14th, I
had one of these blog entries all prepared to post. It was intended to raise a
little more local awareness about missing Puddy. It also reflected how
other-worldly cats become when they go away. It’s almost like they slip into
another dimension or something.
But before I
could hit the ‘publish’ button on my post, one of those dead cat updates
landed. A white cat, with black markings, lying at the side of the road about
half a mile from us. Could somebody check if it were alive or dead? I got in
the car and drove down. The cat was dead all right. I looked it over. It was
largely unmarked by whatever had hit it. It had happened recently.
I was sure
it was Puddy.
I got a bag
from the car and gathered the body up into it. I drove it home and placed it in
the coal bunker on a blanket. That may not sound terribly dignified by it is
dry and protected place. It seemed for the best. I felt very sad and wished I
had searched a little more thoroughly and a little further afield for my cat. She had many
good years left, mooching around our back yards and snoozing in our spare
armchair. It was a shame.
I had to
tell Patricia and she was justifiably very sad. Patrica and the cat had bonded in
a gentle way that had hardly seemed possible when the hissing little demon had
first entered our lives.
I went back
to my desk and reread the blog post that I had been ready to share. I rewrote
it in a rather mournful tone, telling the sad tale while it was still very raw. I hit send. There were a
lot of warm, sad, reactions from good people and I appreciated them all.
Are you with
me so far?
In the afternoon,
Patricia said she would like to see the cat. To say good bye and maybe help
with a little closure. I went back to the coal bunker to make the cat as
presentable as possible.
It was while
doing that that I started to notice things. Were the black markings in the
exact position where Puddy’s black markings had been. Was Puddy really that heavy?
I got out my phone and started to compare photos of Puddy with the cat I now
had. The markings were very similar. One black patch over one eye. A blotch of
black on the spine. But was the photo reversed and was the black patch over the
right eye? Surely this was my cat. A little altered in her deceased state, as
was inevitable, but how could it not be? Then, a thought occurred. Puddy had been neutered and, because she was a stray, the tip of her ear had been snipped to confirm this
to anyone subsequently checking her.
This poor
unfortunate cat’s ears were intact.
Patrica had
her jacket on, in the hall, and was ready for her viewing. I looked at her.
“I don’t
think this is our cat.” I said.
What was
meant to be a quite respectful viewing turned into a forensic examination. It didn’t
take long. The cat we had was not Puddy, no question.
I often feel
stupid. I sometime wonder if it’s my default setting. But I have rarely felt as
stupid as this. On the one hand, and with all respect to the deceased cat,
there is an element of dark humour in it. Not only had I brought the wrong cat
home but I had also published a dirge to my own cat and shown it to my
occasional readers at large. But, worse than this, I had brought a little unnecessary
grief into our home when there has been grief enough there already. That was
what really got me. My carelessness.
I went back
to the housing estate adjacent to where I had found the cat and did some door to
door visits. Nobody I could find knew of the cat. That cat has now been committed
to eternity in an entirely respectful manner but their identity remains unknown.
If you are missing a cat that looks like mine, and you live in Castlebar, you
can contact me via the comments section and I’ll tell you what I know. I’m
sorry if you find out this way. I really am.
The next
evening, as we were having dinner, a hangry meow wafted in from the back yard.
Puddy was out there, stressed and very keen to have some food. Perhaps the
notes I had dropped around the estate had speeded her release from somebody’s
shed. Perhaps she had just got lost and taken this long to find her way back.
Whatever
happened, she’s back now. Old routines re-established. We are glad to have her
back. We always valued her but maybe now we value her a little more and, who
knows, maybe she even values us- no, let’s not be silly.
All I know
is that, on the second evening of her return, she jumped up on the couch and
settled her head in Patricia’s lap. A thing that has never happened before.
Perhaps it’s
true what they say. That there’s no place like home.
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