June 2003
We adopted Bryde in June of 2003. She was 2 years old.
August 2003
She had only been a house cat, never outside as she’d lived next to a busy road.
September 2003
There had been a lot of chipmunks where she’d lived and she’d spend hours watching them through the windows.
My job was to take her outside in a harness and teach her about being outside. Ones doesn’t lick all the dew off the grass, eat wasps, leave the yard, stalk the bobcat and bears, and one does stay out of my gardens.
October 2003
The previous owner had played roughly with her, but not meanly. She learned to growl at anyone’s approach and to spike as necessary.
November 2003
She loved any small space and would try to get into it.
December 2003
December 2003: Her first snow
She took to the snow just fine, as long as we were out there with her.
January 2005
No box was too big or too small…
April 2005
She loved supervising my gardening activities.
Over the years she stopped growling and didn’t spike people as much. She even started to purr when she was around 12 – 15 years old. One could not really hold her, but in the last 3 – 4 years she has taken to liking being patted.
January 2006
She was very photogenic and presented lots of silly or cute opportunities for capturing her behaviors.
July 2008
A basket I found at a tag sale that she loved for a while.
June 2012
She was 11 years old in this photo. This was “her” bed.
December 2012
She has always loved the Christmas tree and claimed it as hers.
Christmas 2014
She loved opening her stocking at Christmas, mostly because I put lots of catnip under the wrapping paper.
January 2016
She never liked it when I took the Christmas tree down, but would supervise the project because it involved boxes to get into.
March 2018
She loved the drips after a shower and would stand outside and comment loudly on how long it was taking us to finish.
March 2018
She had slowly become more blind, deafer, and developed arthritis. I believe 2018 was the last year she was allowed to roam outside due to this. She needed a stool to get up on the couch.
I’d gotten her a set of steps years back for getting up on the bed.
March 2018
My husband made her lifts for her bowls to help her eat more easily.
July 2018
The Big garden was enclosed and had shady areas. So I would take her out with me and shut the gate. That way she couldn’t wander into danger, but could help supervise my work and look for critters.
November 2018
October 2019
When “her” bed was moved downstairs, the steps went too and she was fine with that.
Christmas 2019
January 2020
I think she liked the bed here because it now got lots of south sun.
January 2021
When the bed was moved back upstairs, the treadmill made a poor second. I did finally get the bed set back up and her stairs in place, but I don’t think she has used it yet.
January 2021
The couch became her favorite this winter as it sits right in front of the masonry heater and is toasty warm.
February 2021
If I am working in the office, she will sleep on the floor in front of the wood stove, so I put her catnip bed there.
February 14, 2021
Her birthday is Valentine’s Day. Last night she gave us a scare when about 3:30 PM she came up stairs yowling. I couldn’t see anything wrong, patted her and went back to what I was doing. I heard a thump on the other side of the room, and went to look. There was a puddle on the treadmill, and when I wiped it up, it was bloody. She was uncomfortable but didn’t seem to be in pain.
I checked her and she appeared to be bleeding from her urethra. I called the vet but they were closed. A new thing has happened in this area in the last few years. An Emergency Hospital for animals opened and I’ve heard horror stories of high hundreds and thousands of dollars spent on pets there.
Every single vet I called, who were all closed, referred me there. I called for a price to be seen and it was $131. BUT! The wait, in your car, in deep winter, at the hospital, was 10 hours!! Not happening.
My friend Tom knew someone who could get her amoxicillin and so he picked it up and we gave her the first dose at 7 PM. She took it easily. She then went to sleep on the couch, and seemed relatively comfortable.
When I got up at 5 AM this Sunday morning, Valentine’s Day and her birthday, she met me upstairs and looked a lot better. She came downstairs with me and drank a bit of water. It looked like she’d eaten in the night.
I gave her more medicine at 7 AM, again without problem. Then I made her the daily egg (she’s eating it above) and she ate it all and went to sleep. She seems much more comfortable so far, and I hope we can make it until tomorrow without problems. If she is a lot better, I probably won’t subject her to a vet visit.
She hasn’t been sick in a decade that I can remember, just the old age stuff. Wouldn’t you know, the day before her birthday…
She has been a lot of company since my husband has been gone. She spent most of her time with him over the years. But she has taken to me over the last few months and I’d hoped losing him wouldn’t affect her too much.
She’s so old my dread is she goes next, relatively soon. That will be hard to take so soon.
But so far, we are doing ok, and hopefully she has a good while left here with me.