And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.
Well…
Last week, I wrote, and I quote, “But every now and then, something happens. It usually happens in a flurry, almost as if the Universe (or whatever) is sensing that I’m reaching a low point and so it throws a bunch of positive stuff my way.”
And then there’s other times. Like this week. Times when the Universe seems to decide instead to throw everything at me to the point where I wonder if I’m going to have to cancel writing the blog at all because I simply can’t find anything to be happy about.
Early Monday morning, at 2:00, my husband Michael fell. The sound shook the house. I was still awake, and I ran down to see what happened. I found Michael on the floor in the doorway of what is currently his room – usually Olivia’s. He was disoriented and confused and I knew there was no way I should try to get him up. I called 911, discovered that my 3-story condo is not the best place to have an emergency, and then trailed after the ambulance as they drove him up the hill to the hospital.
Where he’s been all week. He had a UTI, which may or may not have gone to sepsis, depending on who I talk to. Inside of Michael, the area where the previous feeding tube had entered his stomach was ulcerated. In the ambulance, his heartrate dropped to the 30s, his temperature was only 95 degrees, and his blood sugar was through the roof.
As of today, depending on who I talk to, his UTI/maybe sepsis has resolved with IV antibiotics. They used a scope to go down his throat and inside, where they cauterized and clipped the feeding tube ulceration. However, he is still vomiting a lot, and they don’t know what’s causing that. There was talk of a bowel obstruction, but that has since been proven nonexistent.
It’s been a very frustrating and frightening week. I canceled classes and clients and resumed my daily trips to the hospital, though at least this time, the hospital is literally just up a hill. I can see it from my bedroom window. I make a point of waving out my window every night before bed, in case Michael is looking out, though even if he is, he likely can’t see me. But it makes me feel better.
And so I thought, What the hell am I going to write about this week? I think I’m going to have to admit defeat and not write anything. Then a former client responded to one of my Facebook posts. I’d said about this hospital, “They don’t even have limited visiting hours like Froedtert, so I can easily stay late and work in his room, and then coast down the hill and go to sleep. Plus – they have fabulous food.” And my client said, “That’s Kathie. Find the thing to be grateful for to keep yourself going. You go, Kathie.”
That’s me? I go? Huh.
So I kept thinking about it. Yesterday, I came home tired from the hospital, having spent another afternoon and evening watching my husband vomit over and over. I opened my door and was greeted, as always, by our dog, 50-pound Ursula, nose-first, checking me over. But she wasn’t alone at the door.
Standing next to her was a little orange cat. Out of all the cats I’ve had before, I’ve never had a door-greeter. But there he was.
Oh, this cat.
Most know that I recently lost both of my older cats within 5 weeks of each other. Edgar Allen Paw was fourteen years old. His legs suddenly went out permanently from under him, and he lost all bladder control, and he was in pain. So I helped him cross to the other side. And then five weeks later, my Muse, on her 21st birthday, suddenly collapsed. And then she was gone. And I was deep in grief. Over all of it. This entire awful winter. But Muse’s passing was pretty much what did me in.
I wasn’t going to get another cat. I am too old, I said. I don’t want my pets to outlive me. Yet a couple weeks later, I somehow found myself on various animal shelter websites, “just looking.”
When I went in to the humane society where I used to work in high school and college, I didn’t connect with the cat I went to see. I connected with a little orange cat named Oliver.
Who was only a year old.
I met him, then left him behind. I cried all the way home. I’d picked up Muse’s ashes just before I stopped at the humane society. She rode beside me in the car. I kept one hand on the lovely carved wooden box that held her.
And then I waited a week. But after a week, a quick check of the website showed Oliver was still there. So I went back. And he came home.
Where he started out shy. And then…he evolved into a holy terror. Just like Muse, who we’d had since kittenhood and whose nickname, given to her by Michael, was Demon. Holy cow. You know that game that kids play, where they try to cross a room without ever touching the floor? Someone, somewhere, taught this cat that game. I watched him fly down the steps, up onto the back of the loveseat, leap to the back of the couch, leap to the cat tower, the coffee table, the island, the other counter, back to the island and then through the air to me, where I sat on the loveseat.
So he’s like Muse. And…he’s also an orange tabby, like Edgar. But I was used to old cats, who basically slept and kept me company. I wasn’t sure I’d done the right thing, bringing him home into what was essentially chaos, and HE was chaos.
But on this day, I was exhausted. The condo was quiet, with Michael in the hospital. And this little orange cat met me at the door, along with Ursula, and then like her, he stood quietly under my hand as I pet him from nose to tail. When I moved to my recliner on the love seat, he followed me, waited until my footrest was up, and then he leaped gently onto my lap.
Where he purred, the whole time I cried.
He stayed with me the whole evening. Ursula, doing her part, either had her concrete head in my lap as well, or she was stretched out by my feet.
And I felt better.
Just that morning, I’d posted a photo of Oliver on his cat tower, and said that I was thinking of changing his name to Dennis, for Dennis the Menace. But no. He’s Oliver. And I absolutely made the right decision and brought home the right cat.
A little bit of Edgar. A little bit of Muse. And exactly what I needed.
And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.




