This post is just me ruminating Lily’s death, what it means to me, and how the days have been looking since. To be honest, this is more of a chronicle written for me. It may sound tired and repetitive. I don’t think it’s interesting, unless you want to see what goes on in the mind of someone grieving. If that’s not your cup of tea you can wait a few more days for my July roundup.
To fully understand this post you need to read my previous one.
—
There were many things I had in mind to write about. I had started drafting my monthly roundup as soon as July rolled in. Life felt like it was beginning to pick up due to the combination of lockdown restrictions easing up a bit, at the same time my shifting attitude towards the pandemic. This will stay with us for a long time, so I was deciding for myself what my life would look like in this new normal.
I never for a second thought that my July would be ferociously punctuated by Lily’s passing, scattering all the rest of my thoughts and rendering my plans meaningless.
I feel like I have never truly comprehended that you only get one shot at your pet’s life, and if I did I would have changed my approach to how we cared for our cats.
And yet… Ben told me that, if he had to do it over again, he would not change a thing. We loved our cats the way we loved our cats. We gave them everything we could and it showed in the way visitors awkwardly complimented how lucky these no-breeds are for living the ‘condo life’, the way Ben and I complain to each other about how our cats turn their noses up against Whiskas wet food (because they’ve had better), the way not a single corner of our home was barred to them.
If I had known what I know now, I would have readily squandered more of my time and phone memory recording every meow, every sleeping pose, every little action, every little quirk.
memento mori
It may come as a surprise to most people, but beyond my day-to-day thoughts, I actually think about death a lot. I think of the people I love and how death will come to pass at some point in my life, before my own. It is inevitable. Yet despite all of that I never would have imagined in my wildest dreams that my first painful experience of death would come from a pet.
I was sixteen when my maternal grandfather died. I was a high school student in Palawan, and Papa Tony died in Manila. I found out through a call, or a text message, I can no longer remember. I remember the passing shock and the tears I willed myself to shed. But years later, I admitted to Mom that Papa Tony’s death didn’t make me sad; she said it was okay; I didn’t have the same relationship with Papa Tony as she did.
Everything I heard about his death was through other people’s accounts. How in his wake everyone wore white. How Mama Lud remained stoic throughout the hospital, wake, and funeral. How one of the first things she did when he passed was to put his dentures back in, so that his mouth would not have a sunken appearance.
Mama Lud didn’t break down or shed tears. At least, not immediately. The breakdown came weeks later, when she returned to SM South Mall to do her usual shopping rounds and spotted The French Baker. Family members told of how she started sobbing in the middle of the mall, in public view. In those days she would wait at The French Baker for Papa Tony. Shopping tired her quicker than it did Papa Tony, so she would wait for him. And perhaps, for the first time she realised he would not come.
aftermath
After we laid Lily to rest… I remember the passing of the day. I was either eating or bawling. Ben ordered in. I think we tried to watch B99 or HIMYM. I’m not sure. Ben was the first to take the day off of work, and he told me I should do the same thing. It didn’t even occur to me to have to do that. I thought it was a minor, sad thing, but it wasn’t a bereavement. Bereavement leaves are for people. This was just a pet.
Nightfall was cruel and brutal because it reminded me of the things I could have done differently the night before. I was afraid of waking up again at three in the morning, and see the empty spot in the half-light where I saw Lily last. I was exhausted, my head hurt so much from crying. I had drunk two beers and popped 20 milligrams of melatonin before bed but sleep did not come easy. I still woke up in the early hours.
In the first twenty-four hours I was obsessed with Lily’s body. I asked Ben repeatedly if he was certain that the cat we saw in the box was Lily. I asked if she had the same tail. Lily had a short tail that ended in a curled stub. I kept looking over the railing where she had plunged. The second morning Ben finally relented and accompanied me to the basement. We searched the bottom of the bins. The box was not there. In my mind I thought I could simply ask the maintenance personnel where the collected garbage went. In my mind I could still track her. I looked up pet cremation services on Facebook and sobbed more.
We ordered in more. Ben coaxed me to shower. I found enough strength to keep working out. Exercise produces endorphins, right? I had to pick myself up and get back to routine so I could recover. I reluctantly took out my exercise mat. Two days earlier I had filmed Lily resting on it.
On my first set of warm-ups I had an urge to cry, and kept my tears at bay.
I would feel normal, functional, for an hour, maybe less, before I started seeing Lily in all the corners she left in this house. The bowl of wet food that waited for her, that should have been hers. I would imagine her curled up in her sleeping spots, or resting in the gutter at the balcony. I would imagine her trotting across our bedroom, drinking from the fountain, loafing on the bed in my office. Then I would sob with such intensity I was almost hysterical. I broke down at least four times that day. I would cry so hard that I caused Ben to cry with me.
Desperate for an outlet, I reverted to my primary outlet: writing. I wrote down all the words that came too late.
I tried distracting myself. YouTube. I told Ben we should play Overwatch since it’s mentally rigorous and I usually got invested enough to get salty after a few loses. I couldn’t do it. It didn’t feel right to numb out the pain and thoughts.
As the sun set on the second day I felt the walls and the darkness close in on me. The house was suffocating. I begged Ben to never let any other cat touch Lily’s pink bed, then begged Ben to keep the bed out of my sight.
Ben urged me to try to talk it over other people. It wasn’t like anyone would do. There was only one other person I felt like talking to. I thank Steve, my friend and mentor, for taking the time to comfort me and help me process my feelings. It really means a lot to me. Thank you.
On the third morning, the sadness became muted, like someone took the dial and turned all my emotions into white noise. I didn’t cry once that Friday. I went back to work. I avoided meetings. I cleared my inbox. My manager, Sabina, told me not to push myself, and I reassured her I welcomed the work and I was keeping it very light.
In the evening I drank more beer, searched ‘lily’ on Etsy for any memento I could keep for myself. I looked up lily tattoo ideas and with my G-Tec C3 I sketched a lily on my chest, near my collarbone, over a fading scratch mark that Lily gave me a long time ago. She never meant to hurt me. I got scratched rather violently because pest control treatment were over with a buzzing fumigation machine. It spooked Lily. I picked her up to make her feel safe. It didn’t help her. She wildly lunged away, using me as a springboard. I remember looking at the cut in the mirror, fresh blood a bright red, hoping it wouldn’t scar. Ben thought the tattoo idea was beautiful.
Today, Saturday, I woke up feeling normal. Like some terrible, ominous dream I still woke up at three in the morning. But no matter. I had brunch with Chad and Jeph as we had scheduled. I worked out for the second time without Lily playing on my mat. The sadness faded in the background. I was getting used to Lily’s absence, and no longer tried as hard to conjure the image of her on the couch, on the ottoman, at the balcony. I didn’t pull up images of her on my phone at every thought. I felt the gulp of sadness break the surface a few times—especially when Ben and I took out the trash and returned to the basement— but it wasn’t enough to make me cry. As I washed the dishes in the afternoon, I let a thought escape my lips:
‘I wonder where Lily’s body is now.’
Ben gave me a look that told me to stop. Stop ruminating. Stop asking questions we will never know the answers to. Stop holding on to a memory of the mangled remains of a cat you cuddled four nights ago. Stop beating yourself up for not being able to bury or cremate her. I didn’t say any more. I knew these thoughts were dark and leaden. Perhaps someday, I wouldn’t even need to tune them out. They wouldn’t occur to me any longer.
In the evening I felt strong enough to draft this post, and as I wrote the opening and Ben came over to hug me I felt new, fresh tears roll down my cheeks. And now we’re here. But there’s something I haven’t told you yet.
new cat
What I didn’t care to share in my previous post was that after we laid Lily to rest there was a moment of calm where Ben ordered Yellow Cab, I was numb but not crying, and we were discussing the adoption of a new cat. Ben was exceptionally concerned for Luna. He didn’t want her to be alone. In the past when we talk about our cats and their bond, we called Lily our greatest gift to Luna. Prior to her Luna was temperamental, unsociable, and a bit mean. I admit in my head it was already a given that I would pick up the next scared, shaking, starving kitten we would find in the street.
But the reality set in. It was hard enough to find a Grab Pet to take us to the vet even in normal circumstances. In the last year it was the cause of a few fights between me and Ben. A vet visit would sometimes take half your day, between finding a Grab and waiting an hour or two for your cat’s name to be called at the clinic. We wouldn’t have the capacity to arrange the vaccines and other health checks. So Ben looked for cats up for adoption.
In the end, he found a rescued cat that had been up for adoption since March. We wanted someone near Luna’s age. The cat’s name was Hope. She was found lifeless and was nursed back to health. She was born roughly October last year, which would make her even younger than Lily.
The contact was free to bring us the cat noon on the same day Lily died. We wasted no time. The building guards watched us at the gates that morning, first to claim Lily’s box, then to claim a second cat.
The guard had asked me if we cremated the body. The question stung. I told him we disposed of it. Tinapon namin. And I felt the shame course through every step we took back to the building.
As we walked through the lobby door with Hope, another guard asked me as we passed, ‘Did you buy that?’ ‘No, we adopted it.’ ‘What breed?’ ‘No breed.’ ‘Would you like to buy a cat with a breed?’ ‘No… salamat.’ I don’t blame her callousness. Filipinos are a bit blasé about death, and in a developing country being enterprising is seen as a virtue.
In my mind I resolved stonily that we got this cat for Luna. It has nothing to do with my grief, my Lily. I wasn’t trying to fill a void.
miso
Ben and I weren’t particularly fond of the cat’s given name. We were going to christen her with one of our own. For the first time, the name for the cat didn’t come to us immediately. For Luna and Lily, it came naturally and just suited the cat. Ben and I cycled through female cat names and rejected each other’s suggestions.
In the end, I told Ben her full name is Miso Ming, both names he suggested that felt right. I told him, ‘She’s not Lily.’ He told me to never hold it against the cat. It has done nothing wrong.
Miso is a sweet cat. Incredibly sweet. She would respond to you and nuzzle against you and put her paws on you. Her meows are shy, clipped squeaks that seem to escape her by accident. The woman who rescued her shared that she had to give Miso up because she had three other territorial cats. That must have been the reason for her meekness.
On the first night we kept her in the bathroom, like we did with Lily. But Luna was already alert and apprised of her presence. She ventured timidly into parts of the house. On the second night she was alert and hopping up on our bed. I ignored this development because it reminded me of Lily’s first nights with us. She had been the very same, hopping around in the sheets like a little rabbit. The fog of her hunger had cleared and her personality had shown for the first time.
I regarded Miso with so much… holding back. I still do. She’s not Lily’s replacement. Yet I feel like every time I pet her I overwrite my memories of Lily. Miso is a bit larger, longer than her. She didn’t settle in my arms. How big was Lily again? How small were her paws? Do I remember how she felt in my arms, just four days prior? Do I remember the look on her face when I’d pet her? I felt as though I had known Lily so well, and yet she was disappearing fast.
On Friday morning, I felt Miso bound up the bed and nuzzle her head against my fingertips. It was an incredibly sweet gesture. For the first time I welcomed the notion of her. I took more photos of her. She slept on my desk as I worked and I watched her roll on her back as she slept. Why did she trust me so quickly?
As Ben came to bed that night he snapped a photo of her. She was on my pillow, beside me as I slept. There were points during the night I could tell she was up and about, playing with the cat toys, knocking our laundry basket over.
This morning she came to my pillow as I stirred. I allowed myself the moment with her. I patted her and she welcomed it. As I got up she followed me out of bed.
My penchant for monikers came quickly. I call her Miso Paste, and sing ‘Lovely Miso, miso paste’, to the tune of The Beatles’ Lovely Rita. This cat seems to be fond of me. She hasn’t tried to bite or scratch me. Sometimes, when the light hits her at the right angle, she’s the spitting image of Lily. But her eyes are much darker, and she doesn’t have Lily’s fire or fearlessness. I don’t mind. She’s not Lily. She’s Miso. I cannot help but think that she’s here to help heal my broken heart. She will not replace Lily, but life goes on.
She hasn’t started befriending Luna yet. They’re wary of each other.
balconies
In the wake of Lily’s death Ben and I have hardly let Luna out the balcony. I get frantic when the balcony is left open a few moments and I can’t find the cats. Barring Lily’s absence the balcony is the most tangible change to our household. It feels a bit wrong to keep the cats closely guarded. Part of my fond memories with Lily, and the reason she frequented my office and my coworkers would see her in the background, was because she came and and went through the balcony window as she pleased. There was a certain joy in knowing it was a lovely afternoon for the kits. That they could choose anytime to bask in the sun or sleep inside. There was a pleasant casualness to taking a break and not immediately knowing where the cats are. Finding them outside, with Ben, or tucked away in a hidden sleeping spot.
I don’t know if I can relax again about the balcony. To be honest, I wouldn’t be able to bear the humiliation of having a second cat die because we let it out the balcony. When Lily died all the guards somehow knew it was my cat.
lilies
The human memory is unreliable. Witnesses to a court case can misremember events. Someday, all my heartaches will be muted and distant and all I will remember of Lily is her image. I have written down many memories in my personal notes. I don’t feel the need to share them here. You’ve probably read enough to get a picture of her personality. Perhaps I might typeset them properly in another post. Some highlights I can tell you is that she weirdly loved licking my phone. She also licked butter and crumbs off my breakfast plate, an unnatural sweet tooth. As I read my notes now, the sadness doesn’t swell anymore. I have accepted that she’s died. I wonder if a year is enough for her to exist in my memory and my heart. I wonder if it’s worth inking my skin to commemorate a brief existence. Perhaps I am being unfair. There are years in my childhood I remember vividly, as though they spanned lifetimes.
Ben and I are still mourning her.
—
I knew you
playing hide-and-seek and
giving me your weekends, I
I knew you
Your heartbeat on the high line
once in twenty lifetimes, I
— Taylor Swift, cardigan
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