Loss

Loss by Monday

As it has been said “Loss can not be read only felt” and in my twenty-four years I have felt loss.

Loss of a father that I never got to know. Loss of home, of family though some would disagree that pets are family.

I have spent my entire life moving never staying in one place for more then a few years. For me death and loss travel hand in had.

When I was eight my cat Max was killed by a car. Soon after his death the person who owned our home sold it forcing us to move.

At the age of ten a great uncle died and again we lost our home though I am unsure as of why.

Over the next seven years we moved five times and I lost twelve small caged pets.

When I was seventeen my mom’s pet chameleon who’s name was Roxy fell in her cage breaking a leg. She died two days later then my pet rat Zoe died of cancer and then just two weeks later we lost her sister Chrissy. At that same time my mother and I were evicted from our apartment. While staying with a friend we had to leave our dog a wonderful sweet animal by the name of Dragon who had been a part of out family since I was six. And my cat that I got as a barely weaned kitten when I was ten who bore the name Stupid with dignity with another friend.

We had just made arrangements to join my aunt and uncle in their home in tiny town in Nevada. So we packed up our things and called our friend who was pet sitting for us, only to learn that my beloved Stupid had run away. I never saw him again and have hopes that some lucky little girl had found him and given him a loving home. To this day I have yet to speak to that ‘friend’ again.

Shortly after leaving California and arriving in Nevada I lost my little pet lizard who had the name of Slide. He had been named for song ‘Slide’ by the Goo Goo Doll’s, which had been popular at the time I had found him. I still think of him fondly whenever I hear that song.

Things went well for a while. We found a nice house and got jobs in the gambling town of Wendover that borders Nevada and Utah. I got some new pets. For a while before we found the house we were staying with my cousin’s father. He had been married to my uncle’s wife.

While we were there I found a stray cat, he was beautiful black and shiny. I named him Xander. Dragon had taken to him instantly. I also gained two new pet rats mom and I named this pair Hugs and Kisses.
At that time the man we had been staying with was watching a dog for a friend who in the six months that we were there only came by to see her twice.


Once just to visit the man, not paying the dog any mind, then a few months later when after she had had a litter of puppies. They took one of the puppies and never came back. I had also claimed one of the pups. He was the only male in a litter of seven. He was a rolly chubby little thing. I named him Chubs.

Feeling bad about the obvious neglect towards Chubs’ mother Blondie I started taking care of her she gained back the weight that she had lost and we bonded. She became very protective of me and I loved her.

At the time we found a new home there was no question as to weather she was coming with us.

When we moved into our house we were surprised to find that we inherited a new family member in way of a tiny black kitten that had been abandoned by the former renter of the house. Mom was taken the moment she saw the scared little thing hiding under the bathtub.

We named her Ki-ki. It was no surprise that when Ki-ki became of age we were expecting a litter of Xander/ Ki-ki babies. Ki-ki had four kittens all females and despite our best efforts to find homes for them we never did, so they stayed with us. We had to color code them with yarn when they were small to tell them apart seeing how they were all black. The names they gained came from the color they wore. We named them. Wheaties for the white string Rosy for the pink string, Worange for the orange string and Mellow-Yellow or Mel-Mel for the yellow string.

Blondie had claimed Mel-Mel very early on and the pair became inseparable. Wheaties became a beautiful large cat. Sleek and lean and had a superior attitude towards all of the others. Her name quickly grew to Queen Wheaties-The Amazon. She would have been a money making show cat if I had had the chance.

We lived happily for quite a while then Hugs got sick and passed away. But much to my relief her death did not trigger a snowball of pain as deaths had done in the past.

Though Xander had run away. He had a habit of going back to our old home regularly and would come back after a day or so. But one day he slipped out and never came back.

Ki-ki would slip out as well but when Xander disappeared I made sure she stayed in as much as possible.

She got pregnant again this time giving birth to a litter of three, to girls and one boy. I thought it interesting at the time that both Blondie and Ki-ki had seven babies all girls except one.

Again after trying to find home for the kittens with no success the three became members of the family as well. At least these kittens were different colors. One was fluffy gray female we named Smokey the other girl was a Siamese with chocolate brown markings, her name took ages to pick but we finally settled on Nonsense or Nani for short. It wasn’t until much later that I learned that Nani meant “what?” in Japanese.

The boy who was shiny black like his mother we named Sooty. He was a sweet affectionate little thing and quickly became my favorite.


Again things when well for a while then we lost Kisses. All went to Hell after that. Again the place where we lived was sold and the new owners in effort to get more then the house was worth hiked up out rent, struggling to pay the rent and other bills we ended up loosing luxury items such as paid television and a cell phone. Then still struggling we lost our electricity.

After three months of camp cooking and paying for showers at the local camping ground we could no longer afford to stay in the house and were forced to leave.

We made the heartbreaking choice of simply opening the door and letting the cats out. They ran off into the wooded area surrounding the house where many strays lived. We kept the kittens that were only a few months old at the time and too young to fend for them selves. It hurt loosing Ki-ki but at the time it was for the best.

We basically moved across the street into a motel that allowed pets. Chubs had to be kept chained out behind the motel in an open field that had a single tree and an abandoned car. That car had been cleaned out and made into a doghouse of sorts. He was quite happy there. Dragon, Blondie and the three kittens joined us in the motel room.

We were only there a few weeks when out of nowhere Mel-Mel turned up. For some reason she didn’t want to stay in the room she would come in, eat, and visit with Blondie for a while the disappear for a while only to return again.

That Christmas when we had been in the hotel for about eight months Ki-ki returned. She was all fluffy from her winter coat and was quite content with settling in and making herself at home.


We stayed for a bit longer then in February later we decided to move back to my birthplace in Arizona. So with out tax returns we bought a car packed it up and headed out. We decided to go through Utah so my mom could stay good-bye to her sister. I regret making that trip to this very day.

About twenty miles away from Salt Lake City we passed by the small town of Toole (to-will-a) and were pulled over. It turns out that the car that we had purchased had not been fully legalized by its former owner. My mother received a ticket and the officer took our license plate telling us to either go to Salt Lake and stay there until the legality of the car was sorted out or go back to Wendover and do the same there.

With the problems in Wendover over the casino buy-outs jobs were scarce. We decided on Salt Lake but quickly leaned that we could not keep the animals. So with a heavy heart we took all but Dragon and Sooty to the Humane Society and gave them away. I cried for days.

While in the motel mom searched for a job. I would have too but a few days after we arrived I lost my purse with my ID and S.S. card. We then learned that jobs were few and we were running out of money.

We rented a storage unit for our things and were forced to live in a homeless shelter. As such we lost Dragon and Sooty as well.

Then when we remained unemployed we lost the storage unit as well. All we had were a few changes of clothing my personal CD player my mothers purse and a single photograph of our three dogs that I had at some point sewn into the belly of a plush dog stuffy that I had had ever since I was very small.

The plushie is the only thing from my childhood that I still have.

After a very long time of struggling in the homeless society of Utah we ere moved into housing. After housing were graduated into a hotel. At this point both mom and I had jobs. After the hotel we moved in with a friend from work then after that into an Apartment.

By this point I had quit my cashier job at Mc Donald’s to work in the custodial department at a movie theatre in the same mall where the Mc Donald’s was located. A few of the folks who worked late at the theatre had told my mom and I about some of the openings at the theatre and had also given us referrals.

The next eighteen months were a dream we had a home of our own wonderful jobs and a small cushion of security. I even was able to get my first banking account.

I woke up one morning to find that my mom and a friend that I had made at the theatre who was also out next door neighbor had gone to a pet store and bought me to gerbils. They were named Caramel and Licorice. A short while after that I had noticed an add offering a free cat to a good home. After living so long with out a feline companion I answered the ad and Buddah who was named for his large belly joined our family.

For Mother’s day in 2005 I went to the Humane Society and found a dog for my mom. She named him Cuddles.

That Christmas one of my dear friends, who had been staying with me at the time, had gone down to the dumpster to take out the trash and found a kitten that had been abandoned.

She was nearly frozen from the snow and I spent the hour before I had to leave for work trying to warm her tiny body.

I fretted about her all night, worried that I would come home and find that she had died. But to my surprise she was fine. I also leaned that there was something wrong with her back legs and she could not walk.

Despite of the fact that she could not stand on her back legs she was perfectly healthy and happy. We named her Misty.

Again our lives went well but in May of 2006 that all went to Hell.

The theatre decided to out source the custodial department and I was suddenly unemployed. It took me several weeks to find a new job but the damage was done. We were out of money and out rent was late. The manager was unsympathetic. I found a new job but was physically unable to keep it and after just a few months I was unemployed again. Again it took several week before I found another job but it was too late.

We lost our home again.

In October we moved out into a hotel were we stayed until mid November then moved to a less expensive motel. I had to leave my job again due to medical reasons. I spent four months in search of a new job with no luck.

In February of this year I woke one morning to find that my beloved little Licorice had passed away during the night. And as tradition dictates more pain is to follow.

Now the manager of the motel where we are still currently living had told us that people are complaining about Cuddles and we either have to get rid of him or move out. We have no choice but to take him back to the Humane Society. We have no where else to go and no money. I am having to pawn the few items that I have that are worth anything to help pay the rent and to pay the placement fee for the shelter.

I know loss and I have felt it. And I have often wondered how much loss the human soul can bare…

I have never seen my mother look so old before, I have always seen her as a strong, independent woman but… now it seems as though she has aged ten years.

I am very grateful for my dear friend she took me to the animal shelter and handled all of the paper work while I stood there crying. And when the woman came out to lead him away I said my final good-byes. “I love you little brother.” I will always remember him by that name for no matter where he is he will always be my little brother and as long as I live I will always love him.

As I write this I know that there is still one more painful hurdle I must jump before there is any chance of healing. I have to be there for mom when she gets home from work…

I have already packed Cuddles things away. His bowl, his bone and his collar that we took from him before the shelter claimed him. The hardest thing to pack was his cute colorful t-shirt. He had a Super Man shirt once but it had become so worn that we had to throw it away. Now I wish that I had kept it, even though it was torn and smelled bad.

His favorite toys were empty two-liter soda bottles; I would screw the lid down as tight as I could so that it would take him more then a minute to chew it off.

I doubt that I will ever drink another Pepsi without remembering. I know that it will hurt deeply when I simply have to throw the empty bottles away.

For a few short painful hours I wished that I had never gotten him but as my brother told me while I was crying in his ear… “Remember the happy times, don’t dwell on the pain.” Or something like that, I wasn’t very coherent at the time.

Grief does strange things to people. Take myself for example. I don’t like being out in public. I don’t have agoraphobia per say but a dislike of physical contact. I rarely even let my mom hug me. I tend to be very uncomfortable in public settings, especially if I am in a small space with several people.

And as such I was surprised when a woman, a complete stranger came up to me before Cuddles was taken away and hugged me. I sobbed and thanked her. I don’t even know her name.

And after he was gone she came again and both she and my friend hugged me telling me it was all going to be all right.

I wanted to believe her, but when I got home and heard the phantom sound of him on the other side of the door, I finally, truly broke down.

After packing up his things I sat there with the small box on my lap and I cried, I cried harder then I had all day. I was trying to be strong, not to let my mom see my tears knowing that she was hurting just as much if not more then I was.

And my dear friend, who had gone with me when I adopted him, confessed that she had shed her tears the night before, knowing what the day would hold. I believe that she loved him just as much as we did.

I tried hard not to cry in front of her knowing that she might start crying as well.

But when I was alone I could no longer hold in the pain this loss caused…