My Cat Daisey

We got Daisey on December 3, 2004. I'm not sure if there is an 'e' in her name or not, but once when we took her to the vet I think they had an 'e' in it and since then I put an 'e' in it. We got her from my brother's family, who had gotten her from his sister-in-law. They got rid of her for various understandable reasons. We got her so our cat Simon could have a "friend". They fought a lot, so I guess they were more like siblings than friends. We kept her inside for a few months but then I would let Daisey out of the house sometimes. One of the first times I let her out she didn't come back in. I was so scared. I drove around the neighborhood looking for her. When I got home she was there, I was so relieved.

We got her before we had kids. When our oldest was about 20 months old my husband and I went to Disneyland with my father-in-law and left my son with my sister. When we came back we only had one cat in the house, not two. Turns out that Daisey was not in the house when we left for our trip. We were driving away and realized we needed to feed the cats, and when we went back in she must have ran out, which we didn't know. Anyway, I went to the animal shelter and she was the last cat in the cages. A neighbor had called animal control and they picked her up.

Daisey could be very annoying. Just before we moved to Mapleton she had a "peeing on things in our house" issue. It was disgusting. After we moved I told Dave I couldn't handle her being an indoor cat. I didn't think we should put her outside because she is declawed in the front paws. But she is a street smart cat (that term will be ironic when this post is over). She did GREAT outside. We'd find birds and mice in our yard or on our patio. I'm so proud when our cats actually DO cat things.

She'd try to come in our house but I'd never let her. She did get in last Saturday when Dave lit our fist fire in our new wood burning stove. That is an entire different post for a later day.

To get to the point of this post... on Tuesday my son went out the front door and said, "mom, there is a dead cat on the road. I think it is our cat." He left and I went to see the dead cat, obviously it had been hit by a car. It did look like Daisey. When I was about 6 feet away I thought, "Oh, that isn't her." But then as I got closer and could see her face I knew it was her. Our sweet, annoying Daisey was hit by a car and is no longer with us. Dave buried her in our field. I just gently pushed her to the side of the road and Dave took care of her when he got home. I didn't know if I should take her right then or not. But it was actually kind of like closure to me to be able to look at her from our front window throughout the day. It was also a good time to discuss with my kids how spirits and bodies separate at death. We sat on the couch and could see Daisey across the street. I did the whold glove/body, hand/spirit lesson with them. The kids took it surprisingly well. Matthew almost cried for a split second and that is all. I did actually cry. And I cared more than I thought I would. RIP Daisey, I love you.