Mimi

Our good friend and oldest cat Midnight was hit by a car last night or this morning and died. His name is  Midnight, but we usually called him Mimi.

He was big and black and beautiful. He came to us from the animal shelter when he was a little kitten, about 7 years ago. He was very shy with people and also very dignified. It took a long time to get him to come to you, and only a few rare people other than us, his family, befriended him. Nicu was one of those people.

We all felt sick about it when Ed called after he got to work this morning and said that he saw a big black cat that he thought was Mimi about half a mile from our house, on Rt 275, which a busy road. We were hoping that it wasn't him, but when Ed brought him home we all knew it was.

One thought that came into my head was "I hate cars", because I needed someone or something to blame. Then I thought, "We should not let the cats be outdoors". The girls said that too, and then we all knew that keeping them indoors is not the answer. Would they have a longer life? Most likely. Would they have a better life? We all thought no. Right now, our cats are free to come and go as they please. This is their home, here with us, and they certainly enjoy lying on the couch for hours on end in the winter, but they are also wild, and love to roam and hunt. There's a dead mouse on our front steps right now, and we all thought that maybe this was Mimi's last gift to us. We always find dead birds and rodents near the house, which the cats leave for us after their hunts.

Mimi often came home with leaves and burrs and other things from the woods stuck to him. Sometimes he came home with a new scar from a fight he'd been in. When I held him, I often thought, "Mimi, if you could only tell us of the places you've been to and the things you've seen". But the old quote is true: "If cats could speak, they wouldn't". His presence was enough, and I really felt that it was an honor that as wild as he was, he would come to us and snuggle and let us hold him and pet him. He would never do that with any human unless he really trusted them. So it was really special. I always felt like with him, I was holding a little bit of the wildness.

We'll miss him for sure this winter. During the warm weather we'd see him maybe once a day, sometimes not for 3 or 4 days, when he went to who knows where. But in the winter, he'd always come to the house and sleep on the armchairs or the couch.

What I want to say to him is "Thank you Mimi, for your life, and for being part of our lives. We will not forget you".

Here he is lying near me as I rested in front of the house one day last summer.

Peace