The Wheeze, Reprised

I'm not sure how this story pertains to recovery but I'll wedge it in somehow.  I'm a master with a hammer.  There is no problem that can't be fixed with a good hammer.  There is no hammer that can't be fixed with a big sledgehammer.  And don't get me started on jackhammers . . . 

I really embrace the idea that pain is part of life, that loss is part of life, that death is part of life. Most people aren't exactly thrilled with the concept of pain but are still understand that it visits everyone from time to time.  Alcoholics, however, are on an eternal hunt for a pain-free existence.  It's a fallacy that alcoholism and drug addiction center around a pursuit of pleasure.  In my mind it's much more about the avoidance of discomfort.  I don't care if I feel good as long as I don't feel bad.  At the end of our drinking and using most of us weren't having a good time - we were trying to keep the demons outdoors.  We were watching TV by ourselves, in a blackout.  That isn't fun by anyone's measure.

Anyway, we took our cat to the veterinarian today and the good woman agreed that it was time to set the animal free.  She wasn't doing well and the treatment plans weren't providing anything but a temporary fix.  Sometimes animals get old.  Getting old is different than getting injured or sick.  A doctor can set a broken leg or cure an infection - a doctor can't make an old cat young.

Whenever The Wheeze (and you can bet that's the last time I get to name a pet) would falter SuperK would tell her to let us know when she wanted to go.  She'd been pretty sick the last few days - not eating, not drinking - and we figured she was getting close to the end.  This morning she pushed open the screen door and wandered outside, into the sun and fresh air.  She walked down the front steps and started off down the street like she had someplace important to go - not in a hurry but walking with purpose.  I followed her all the way to the end of the road.  She would stop from time to time and look at me or wander off into a side yard before I corralled her and got her back on track.  This was an indoor cat, mostly afraid to be outside so the whole trip had a strong sense of finality.  I could hear her say: "You're still here?  Go back inside - I've got it now."

I picked her up and took her to a park near our house that has a small pond with a fountain in the middle.  She hadn't been drinking anything at all so she walked falteringly to the edge of the pond and lapped up some water.  I wasn't all that sure was a good idea but figured it was better than her dying of dehydration.  Then, she stepped into the water, front paws first, finally submerging all four feet.  She moved into water deep enough that her belly got wet.  Every now and then she would pat at something that she saw on the water's surface, or maybe a minnow on the bottom.  She never looked back - she looked out into the water.  I was transfixed.  When she was a kitten I would punish her by flicking water in her face.  I had never seen her get anywhere near water.

"I've got 50 feet high neon lights here," she was saying.  "I've got shills with amplified bullhorns screaming at you.  You're aware that I can't talk, right?  Can you please open your eyes and see what's going on?"

After a while I carried her to the path leading back to the house and set her down - she stopped and laid down in the dirt.  I moved her a few yards onto the concrete; again, she flopped down. She was done - she was out of juice.  I brought her into the house, dried her feet, and she snuck behind a piece of furniture.  I know cats like to hide when they don't feel well.  I've heard they like to go someplace to be alone when it's time to die, but I was still resisting the message.

I could almost hear her say: "OK, how about that piece of performance art?  Tell me you're going to forget my last day?  I went wading in a pond, for chrissake.  Now will you PLEASE leave me alone because I feel TERRIBLE."

At the vet's office - once we had made the decision to euthanize - we had about 20 minutes with The Wheeze while the staff prepared the drugs that would anesthetize her and then stop her heart.  She sat quietly in my arms.  She seemed to know.  No fidgeting, no crying, no purring, eyes half-open.  She seemed to be letting go a little already.  I expected her to say: "Are you guys going to be alright?  Because I'm ready to do this thing."

We told her we loved her.  We told her she was going to be missed, that she had been a good pet.  We thanked her for being with us for almost 19 years.

SuperK was holding her chin as the vet injected the first syringe of anesthesia.   Her whole being relaxed almost immediately and her head sank onto the blanket, her eyes widening.  She looked . . . like my cat.  She no longer appeared to be grimacing in pain.  The second syringe held the medicine that stopped her heart, and it worked quickly.  I could almost feel her soul being released.  There was a spark of life and then there wasn't, just like that, just like flicking a switch.

"OK, mom and dad," the vet said.  "Her heart stopped beating.  She's gone."  The vet called her "little friend," which I thought was a good touch.  We appreciated the fact she agreed it was time for our cat to pass into the next dimension.  She excused herself and quietly closed the door.


I was struck by the incredible stillness in the room.  Death seemed to me to be characterized by a lack of motion so profound that it was hard to understand.  It looked like she could get up and move at any time.  It was disconcerting.  I had to fight back an urge to ask the vet to come back in and make sure that the medicine had indeed worked.  We sat together for a while and looked at her lying there, slumped in a beautiful posture of repose.  She was beautiful and she was resting comfortably - it was clear then how much pain she had been feeling.  We could see, in death, how free she now was.  It was a good feeling.  It made us feel like we did the right thing.  She looked like a sleek, antique racing car, sitting quietly - we could almost hear the engine roaring and the whine as the car flashed by.  Her eyes were wide open, but cloudy, opaque.  Her fur was flat and she looked groomed.  Her ears stood upright.  She looked like she was beat and it felt so goddam good to lay down for a while.

Here's the thing about love and companionship: it's wonderful but it's going to end.  I'm so afraid of pain that I'm tempted to forgo years of wonderful times.

I WAS tempted to do that.  Not any more, my brothers and sisters.  Not any more.

Here's another thing about death - it makes you sit up right straight and ponder your relationships with the non-dead.  Not zombie non-dead but those who are still, at this point, technically alive.  I get pissy about people not doing exactly what I want them to do exactly when I want them to do it, and I end up irritated.   When I'm mad at my friends and family it's usually about the most inane crap.  Whatever I'm mad about is not worth it.

Here's another thing about me: I don't learn shit about shit when I'm getting my way.  I don't learn anything valuable when I'm on vacation - the best lessons come when I shoulder my way through some unpleasantness.  At my Step meeting yesterday we read Number 9 - the direct amends Step - and a lot of people talked about how scary the amends process is and how wonderful the results are.  We do it because we need to do it - it's the right thing to do - not because it sounds like a lark.  The famous Promises come into play after we're well into saying we're sorry.  We get 'em when we do the hard stuff.

After our cat had gone to The Big Sandbox in the Sky we sat with her for a while.  I couldn't get past the stark beauty of her corpse.  It was like looking at one of the space capsules that had actually been on the surface of the moon, reconciling the stillness with what had gone before. We were able to think: "I know she isn't going anywhere ever again but, man, where she has been."

The vet offered a personalized cremation service which we declined.  Neither of us are particularly sentimental so the thought of The Wheeze's ashes on our mantle was unappealing. I have trouble walking through the house without knocking something off a table so we both knew where an urn of ashes was going to end up.  I felt guilty making the decision - I spend a great deal of time worrying about whether or not I'm acting the way I'm supposed to be acting, whatever that is.

I had my camera phone with me. 

"Would it be weird to take a couple of pictures?" I asked my wife.

"Oh, god, yes," she said, clutching my arm.  "I was hoping you were going to suggest that."

They're our favorite pictures.  They're better than shots of our failing cat stumbling around.

So we turn on an old sitcom last night.  The episode centers around two brothers - one tasked with delivering the eulogy, the other with disposing of - you guessed it - an urn of ashes from an aunt who had passed away.  In the scene that was sent to us from above, the eulogy brother is in the car, discussing his speech with his father, while the ashes guy is in the background, struggling to get the lid off the urn so he can spread the ashes.  He twists and turns, he bangs it on a tree and against a rock, he falls into the bushes, and when the lid finally releases with a jerk, the remains fly out and cover both of the brothers.  

A message from god delivered by a 20 year old episode of "Frasier."  Priceless.