I am writing this blog post mainly for me and my children, to help us grieve and remember someone we loved very much. Popcorn was a cat, a pet, but yet she was much more than that; she was a part of our family. If you read this blog post, bear with me as I considered Popcorn a furry child. Her passing has been as hard on me as when my grandpa, who was my hero, died. She is dearly missed. Popcorn died on Tuesday morning and I think I am ready to write this blog post.
I am a 100% cat person. I love cats. I love their soft fur. I love their warm furry bodies snuggling up next to me. I love the soothing sound of a cats purr. I love their sweet meows. I grew up with cats. We lived in Pine Canyon and had an acre of land, behind that were huge fields. We had cats to keep the mice in check. You could usually find me out in the garage happily sitting under five or six cats. It didn't matter if it was Spring, Summer, Fall, or Winter, I would go snuggle the cats on an almost daily basis. I have deeply loved every cat I've ever had and I can't remember a time where I didn't have one or two or three. I have also lost many cats, whether to death or being in a position where I couldn't keep them and had to give them away.....each loss has always been sad and heartbreaking. There have been some cats that have touched me more deeply than the others, Popcorn was one of those cats.
It was 2008 and I was living in Ogden. I already had two cats at the time. A friend of mine was living in Brigham City. She was out for a walk one day and came across this sweet abandoned kitten. She took it home and cleaned it up. She couldn't keep her and asked me to take her. I, of course, could not say no to such a sweet little thing. She was this little white and brown fluff ball and I immediately fell in love. She would snuggle up to me at night and sit on my chest when we would watch t.v. The kids fell in love with her too, and so it was that Popcorn stole our hearts. She got the name Popcorn because I thought she looked like a fluffy little piece of Popcorn, the name stuck.
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| Kids loving on Popcorn |
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| Isn't that just the sweetest face you have ever seen? |
Popcorn loved to sleep in sinks. I could often find her curled up in a ball chillin' in a bathroom sink.
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| This up in Ogden when she was still little and mostly white. |
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| This picture was taken last year not too long after we moved into our house. |
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This was taken when we rented the house on Edgehill Drive.
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Popcorn could often be found flopped on the ground on her back. She wasn't a fan of belly rubs but every now and then she'd let me rub her belly. It was just so funny to see her flopped on her back.
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| Our house |
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| Edgehill house |
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| Look at that happy content face. |
Popcorn loved Christmas. She would bat and play with my ornaments and drag them all over the house. Quite frequently, months after Christmas was over and the ornaments put away, I would stumble across a Christmas ornament hiding place. She would take my small ornaments in her mouth to the bathtub and bat them around the tub. She could often be found up in the branches of the tree.
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| Eyeing the ornaments |
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| Playing |
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| She loved that spot. |
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| Chillin' under the tree. |
One of the funnier things Popcorn did was prop herself up against a wall to clean herself. She sometimes fell asleep. It made her look like a drunken bum.
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| House on Wicker Lane |
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| Edgehill house |
She also loved to sit in boxes. She would also climb into clothes baskets but I never got pictures of that.
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| Our house |
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| Edgehill house |
She was known to hang out on the stairs.
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| Our house |
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| Edgehill house. |
Or hanging out on top of plastic containers.
She also loved to sit on the back of my computer chair. She would gently nip my ear for attention and pets. She would snuggle up to my neck and purr. She would rub her face on my cheek. I loved it when she would do that.
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| Ogden house. |
You could pretty much find Popcorn hanging out anywhere.
Her favorite place to chill out was on my brown chair.
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| Our house |
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| Wicker Lane house |
Her favorite thing to do was snuggle up next to my feet and rest her head on my legs. She always seemed to know when I need her to snuggle. She had such a calm and soothing presence. She was a calm and gentle cat. She loved having her ears scratched.
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| I loved it when she would do this. |
Popcorn loved to be outside. She would chase the leaves, climb the trees, and hide in the bushes. She loved to catch birds and mice...then leave them for presents.
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| This was taken October 2013. She was out helping us paint our pumpkins. |
This is the hardest picture for me to post. This is the very last picture that I ever took, ironic that at the time I took the picture I had no idea it would be the last. Popcorn was always waiting outside my bedroom door in the morning, waiting for me to sit on the stairs and pet her. As I would sit on the stairs she would come up to me and rub her head against mine. She would put her little nose on my cheek. She would follow me and nip my heels if I didn't pet her enough first thing in the morning. She would follow me as I would go wake the kids up for school. She was my shadow. She loved Space Man Spiff and would sleep curled up next to him every night. It's so hard to open my bedroom door in the morning and not see her there. In going back through my pictures looking for pictures of her, I found myself regretting that I had not taken more.
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| This picture was taken on October 29, 2014. She had just woken up from snuggling with me while Henry took a nap and I cross stitched. |
This is her final resting place. She loved to roam around the back yard and you could often find her lounging under the pine tree. The vet was very kind to let me bring her body home to bury her. Eventually we will make a headstone for her.
I am writing this next part because I just can't get it out of my head, I keep playing it over and over. I keep asking myself the "what-if" questions. I know it doesn't do any good to ask those questions, but I find my mind wandering down those paths. It was traumatic to lose her, but even much more because I saw it all happen. Tuesday, November 11, 2014 started out like any other day. Popcorn was waiting for me outside my bedroom door like she always did. I stopped on the stairs to pet her like I always did. She rubbed her head against mine, and put her nose on my cheek. She followed me downstairs to wake up all of the kids. As usual, after she had loved me and Space Man Spiff good morning, she wanted to go outside, and was let out. I didn't know she had been let out. I took the kids to school and decided on the way home to stop off at Dick's to pick up a few things. Our driveway is very steep and we have found that it's best to pack into the driveway. We've had too many groceries roll out of the car pulling in front first...and a heavy trailer hitch that landed on my foot. I usually pull into the driveway of our neighbors across the street. I came home and pulled into the neighbors driveway as usual. There was a car coming up the road, and yes it was going too fast, but my van also was blocking the view for them to be able to see anything dart out from the side of my car. I was looking over my left shoulder, watching for this car to go past so I could back into my driveway. I turned to look and make sure everything off to the right was still clear. It all happened so quickly. I saw Popcorn, she had been in the neighbors yard. She would always come running when she knew "mom" was home. She always had to come in for snuggles and loves after the kids were gone to school. She darted out just as the car was passing the tail end of my van. It happened so fast and I, at first wasn't sure if the car had hit her or not, at most I thought she may have been clipped but hoped not too badly. She kept running up into the driveway. She made it up to a pile of leaves right by the front steps and collapsed. I don't think the car that hit her was sure if they hit her or not. They drove up the road a little way and briefly stopped, but then continued on their way. I think that they continued on because they didn't see her body in the road and thought they didn't hit her. It happened so fast that maybe they didn't know what they had hit. Or maybe they saw her finish crossing the road and go up into the driveway and thought they had missed her. I would like to think that if they knew they had hit her and fatally injured her that they would have stopped to help. I say that only because they slowed down and stopped briefly. I don't know, and probably never will. Like I said, all of this happened so quickly....as soon as the car passed, I immediately and quickly finished backing up in the driveway. It was as I was backing up that I noticed the car slow down, briefly stop, and then drive on. I jumped out of the car and ran to her. I desperately hoped that she had just been clipped and had a broken leg or something, an abrasion, anything that could be fixed. But when I got to her body I realized it was much worse. She had no outward sign of being injured. Her tongue was out and she was struggling to breath. Her body was contorted in pain. I knew she probably wouldn't make it, but I could not sit by and watch her die. I had to do something for her. I had to do all I could to save her or at least keep her from suffering too much. I ran into the house and grabbed the first towel I could find. I gently wrapped her in the towel and rushed off to the animal hospital that is just minutes from my house. They tried everything they could to save her. They gave her oxygen and shot her heart full of adrenalin to try and keep it going. They hoped that if they could stabilize her that they could save her. But her heart just faded out. I was in the exam room, praying they could save her, but deep down knowing they probably couldn't, she was in bad shape. The nurse came in and brought me back to the table where her body lay. The staff and doctors were very kind, sympathetic, and understanding. They gave me the time to pet her body and cry. They hugged me and cried with me. They explained to me all of the efforts they went through to try and save her. I asked if I could take her body home, they gently wrapped her body in the towel I had brought her in, and carried her out to the car for me. Nathan came home from work to be with me. It gives me comfort to know that I did all I could for her and that the vet did all he could, and that she didn't suffer long. From the time she got hit until she passed was only about ten minutes.
My heart broke Tuesday morning and it broke again when I had to break the news to the kids. Live Wire and Spider Monkey got home from school first. Tiger Lily, Firecracker, and Lion Heart were sad, but they hadn't yet become as attached to her as I and my kids had. Space Man Spiff took her death the hardest and I knew he would. He sat out in the garage for 15 minutes petting her body and crying for her to get up and not be dead. As a mother, it is one of the worst things in the world to see your children devastated like that and my heart broke for my children's broken hearts. My nieces, who also knew and loved Popcorn came down and we had a little memorial service for her as we buried her. That night was hard, as I was tucking Live Wire into bed, crying with her, and trying to console her, I heard Space Man Spiff downstairs breaking down. I spent several hours back and forth between them trying to comfort them. Wednesday night, was pretty much the same. I had just finished consoling Live Wire and went downstairs to tuck in Space Man Spiff and Spider Monkey. Space Man Spiff's bed is high enough up off the ground to be able to crawl under. Space Man Spiff had some extra blankets under his bed. I found him curled up under his bed in the blankets. Popcorn used to lay there. It has been so hard to mourn her for myself and even harder to watch my children mourn. I wish I could take away all of their heartache and pain.
I decided to help us grieve and move on that I would find all of the pictures of her and put them together. I also decided to write this blog post to help put all of my thoughts together. It's Sunday evening and it was really hard to write this post, but at the same time very helpful. Yesterday was the first day since Tuesday that I didn't cry, although I cried while putting this blog post together. I do know that I will see Popcorn again and my kids know that they too will see her again. She was one of Heavenly Father's creations, he made her, and he loved her too. He called her home, she had filled the measure of her creation. I pray that I was a good steward to her. In this season of Thanksgiving, I am thankful for Heavenly Father for giving us pets like Popcorn for us to love and care for. I am thankful for my friend for bringing her into my life and Heavenly Father's hand in that. She came into our lives at a time when we needed her. She will be dearly missed and I look forward to the day when I can again scratch her ears and feel her nose against my cheek.
