June 1, 2001 ~ Endings
There must be a special place in Heaven for small-town vets. There should be.
It didn�t look good for Sammy. Since he was hospitalized last week, I�d been going to see him every day that they were open... until yesterday. Yesterday I was tired, worn out from the emotional roller-coaster of hope and then hopelessness, of anger and frustration, and mostly, sorrow.
Dr. Tom told me that he wished I were there, so we could sit down face to face and talk. Sam had taken a turn for the worse, he said, and it was very bad. My heart ached as he described the symptoms.
�He can�t survive this, can he?�
�Maybe. He may still be savable. He may not be.� And he told me his plan, which involved another surgery and four to six weeks of recovery. He would die without the operation. I was stunned. Just the day before, we�d been talking about Sam possibly coming home this weekend. Tom told me to think about it, then to come in first thing in the morning so we could visit with Sam and talk about our options.
Options. I didn�t see many. The surgery sounded awful (you don�t want to know the details), and I just didn�t think I could do that to him. Couldn�t put him through that, and we certainly couldn�t afford it. The dogs� people said they would pay for the vet bills, and maybe they will, but if they don�t, it�s our responsibility. So I saw no other choice but to let him go, to put him down. There comes a point when you have to say, �enough.� I was tired of seeing my cat suffer, and if he wasn�t going to get better...
With a heavy heart, I drove to the clinic this morning. I took Sam�s pink wool blanket with me, so they could wrap him in it... so I could bury him with it. On the way there, I had to stop... I pulled into the bank�s parking lot to try to calm down. Tried to wipe away the tears. Pulled out the makeup, but it didn�t seem to hide anything. I could barely speak, when I walked in the door at the clinic. Luckily, I didn�t have to say anything. Tom had Bonnie bring Sam into the exam room. I grabbed a fistful of Kleenex.
I wasn�t expecting what came next. Tom admitted that it was now an emotional thing for him, that he wanted to do whatever he could to save Sam. He wanted to do the surgery at no charge, and take care of him afterwards, at no charge, because he wanted Sam to have every chance possible. He would send the full bill to the dog�s people, and if they paid it, fine, but if they didn�t, we wouldn�t have to pay anything else. And he has only billed us about a tenth of what he should have.
He said he had lain awake last night, thinking of how he would anesthetize Sammy, what drugs he would use. If you don�t know, I have to tell you, Tom and Sam have a history. This cat has had a rough time of it, this last year. Just one thing after another, and he wound up spending weeks at the vet�s last fall, with Tom taking care of him. There are four vets at this clinic, all of them good, and we have lots of animals... about twenty cats, lots of cows and a few horses. But Tom always remembered Sam�s name, always asked about him when we saw him at church or out shopping or at the clinic. I remember, years ago, when I thought I wanted to be a nurse, being told never to cross that line... never to get emotionally involved with the patients. Because it was just too hard, when you found yourself lying awake at night, worrying about them, sad because they weren�t getting better. And now here was Tom, eyes bright and full of hope... he had crossed that line. Surely he can�t do that with all his patients; I know he can�t. It would drive him crazy if he did.
Tom told me that he�d had two other patients with an infection and complications similar to Sam�s, that he had done this surgery on them, and they had survived. He promised me that he would never just keep doing things to Sam, trying one thing after another, if he didn�t think he had a good chance of survival. Most of all, he didn�t want him to suffer. If he opened Sam up and found that it was just too serious, he would put him to sleep right then. I believed him. He convinced me. I agreed to the surgery, which would have to wait until late that afternoon. In the meantime, he told me to visit with Sam as long as I wanted, that they didn�t need the room, and even if they did, Sam and I could just move to another room. He smiled. I wiped the tears away, as I told him, �I came in here thinking I was going to put him to sleep this morning.�
�I know you did.�
I got down on the floor, spread a towel across my lap, and Sam climbed aboard. He rubbed his head against me, looked up at me, flexed his claws contentedly, did more head-rubbing. More claw flexing. Stretched. Wiggled. Was a very happy cat. We sat there, a grown woman and a small black cat, until my legs grew numb, until I had to stand up. Sam reached a paw up and grabbed my jeans, as if to say, �Not yet. Not just yet.� So I stretched a little, stamped my feet, got the circulation going again, and sat back down. Sam climbed back onto my lap, and I petted him for what seemed like a very long time. Talked to him. Told him what a good, brave cat he was, and that everyone was pulling for him. No one came in, no one bothered us.
After about an hour, I picked him up, kissed his head a few times, held him close, and carried him to the back room. Put his towel down, the soft, fluffy, pink one. Placed him gently on the towel, wished him luck, bent down and kissed his head again, petted him, and told him I loved him. Said I hoped I would see him tomorrow, but if not... everything was going to be okay. For the first time in ages, he didn�t seem afraid, as I shut the cage door. He settled onto his towel and relaxed.
June 2, 2001
I had lunch with our friend Earl, yesterday. Earl is to dogs what I am to cats -- he takes care of them. Loves them very much. He told me how his oldest dog, Char, had died the night before, how he�d heard a strange sound outside his window, how he�d known, somehow, what it was -- a death rattle. He ran outside and found Char lying there, eyes glazed, breathing labored, unresponsive. He quickly went inside and called Dr. Tom. Though it was late, two of the vets were out of town, and Tom was just bone weary from trying to do the work of two or three people, he said he would be right there to tend to Char. Of course he would. But when Earl went back to check on her, he found she had already died. It was a quick, gentle death, relatively painless, as deaths go. He called Tom back and told him not to come.
Earl, a crusty old sort, seventy-something, a retired policeman and firefighter, surprised me.
�You know, as we get older, and as we lose our loved ones... a little part of us dies with them, each time,� he said. �They leave empty places.�
Not something you�d expect to hear from Earl.
I had a lot of work to do yesterday. Lost track of time, and really didn�t realize how late it was, when the phone rang. I saw the number on the Caller ID and my heart... just... sank.
It was Tom. He was very sorry, but... he had started the surgery and he�d found that Sam�s condition was not survivable. There was absolutely nothing he could do. Sammy was deeply anesthetized, and he was going to have to let him go. I asked if Sam would know if I was there; he said he wouldn�t. I wonder. Now I wonder.
I thanked him for caring so much and for all he had done, and told him that Larry and I were very grateful. He said he was going to let Sam go now, that it would all be over and they would have him ready by the time I got there.
They handed him to me in a small, sealed cardboard box, a box which had once held vitamins and was marked, �Fragile, handle with care.�
I had Lillian put the box next to me on the seat, and twice, on the way home, I reached out to steady the box so it wouldn�t slide off the seat as I rounded a corner. Instinct, you know.
The cows started mooing when they saw me drive up; they wanted into the back pasture. The horses were ready for their dinner. Everybody seemed to need me all at once. The table was covered with the paperwork that I�d left behind when the phone rang.
Though it made more sense to take care of the living before the dead, I couldn�t bring myself to just leave Sammy there in that box. I let the cows change pastures, then I reached for the shovel and a pair of gloves. The horses would have to wait.
It took a while. I remembered about the rocks in the ground, but had forgotten the tree roots. By the time I was done, my clothes were dripping wet with sweat. I filled the wheelbarrow with two loads of big rocks from the flowerbed borders, and covered Sam�s grave with them. No way would I let any wild animals... or dogs... dig him up.
On my last trip to his grave, I placed some wild, pink Cherokee roses there on the rocks... and thought of his pink blanket. I�m going to burn it. I can�t even imagine letting another cat use it.
The dogs that did this to him are history; I think they took them to the pound. If they were put down, I�m sorry... I guess. But if that�s so, theirs was a much easier death than Sam�s. This didn�t have to happen. It shouldn�t have happened.
And like Earl said, a little part of me is gone now.
�They leave empty places.�
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