Coco

G found Coco in a car engine on the golf course. We estimated that she was about 7-8 weeks of age at the time. We asked the charity to advertise her as 'found and safe with finder', in case this uber-friendly kitten had an owner looking for her somewhere. Well, no-one came forward over two weeks, so we had to decide either to foster her for the charity and find a new home for her through them, or just adopt her straight off the bat.

To be honest, I think G had made his mind up pretty much as soon as he had brought her home:) So, Coco became the newest member of our family.

I guess this is not strictly a foster story, it's more like a skip-the-foster story:)

Coco joined our family in August 2022. And she fit right in, she was promptly taken under the wings of our resident feline big brothers Charlie and Tiger, who became her play pals (that was Tiger, really, more than Charlie) and cuddle buddies.

Coco was a real cat's cat, and besides Tiger, she also befriended a string of foster kittens. Yes, she had no shortage of playmates: life was all fun and games!

Our foster cats Sherlock, Snoopy and Fluffy checking out a new toy (a Christmas present from a fellow volunteer:) with the freshly spayed Coco.

Coco wasn't really what you'd call a cuddly cat: now and again she would come to me looking for cuddles and comfort, but she rarely cozied up to G (all other cats always do).

But she and G had long talks every day - Coco was a great conversationalist:) And she loved to vocalize pretty much every thought and feeling she had. 'Open the door! Feed me! Come stroke me! No-no, I'm not done with you yet - come back and pet me some more! Now you may go! Let me in!' These are, of course, our rough human interpretations of her feline phonations:) Yes, she was always ready to voice her opinions on anything, whether to reproach us for the inappropriate reaction speed to her calls, or just as part of a friendly inter-species banter, or just as a thank you for a good petting session (or so we'd like to imagine:)

Coco mid-speech:)

If I had to describe Coco in just three words, I'd probably say that she was sassy, clever and loud:) And she was also a very quick learner: she picked up the game of Fetch within minutes, and basically aced it immediately:

She really loved this game, maybe because she was just so good at it:)

For her less-than-luxurious beginnings, Coco really liked life's comforts. This green bean bag had been G's birthday present one year, because he really wanted to have something uber-comfy for his playstation gaming. Anyway, long story short, I think he got to use it for that purpose about twice, and then the cats decided to make it theirs:)

And Coco absolutely knew how to get the most out of that green blob in the corner of the living room.

But it was this old cream bean bag that became Coco's bed. Our other cats tend to rotate their sleeping habits: they might use our bed as theirs for a while and then disperse and move on to either the couch, armchair, green bean bag, etc. But not Coco - she tried out the cream bean bag once and that was it.

As soon as Coco was big and strong enough to start exploring the outdoors with our other cats, she established her own routine. While the other three were used to coming in for breakfast at around 9 (after having been let out by G at 6-7 o'clock), Coco always turned up a little later, around 11. This led to Tiger quickly realizing that if he stuck around after his breakfast, there was an extra portion on the way once little miss Maverick arrived, with her 'Feed meeee!' meows threatening to deafen anyone within a three-mile radius. So Coco was a great favourite of Tiger's, and they had great synergy for playing, play fighting, cuddling in front of the fire, helping each other to get our attention when needed.

This year, the morning of G's birthday had started quite routinely: I had fed our other three cats and our three foster cats, and had my own breakfast. As I was gathering the ingredients and equipment for making G's birthday cake, I realized that it was almost noon. So, Coco was running a little later than usual this morning, I thought. But when I passed the dining room window, I saw something on the driveway. Something black and small. And it's really weird that when you run out to see what it is, you imagine the worst, but when you finally get to the small black thing on the driveway and you see that your worst fear has come true and it is indeed Coco who didn't make it all the way home for her breakfast this morning, all you can do is call out to her, begging and hoping for her to reply. But there's no reply. Just silence.

This pain is hard to describe. It's breathtaking, quite literally, you feel yourself gasping for air when you think of how small and helpless and young she was. It's gut-wrenching. Even a month later it can hit you out of nowhere, and you often find yourself walking around with a lump in your throat and your stomach in knots. Losing someone whose wellbeing was your responsibility is also, of course, speckled with guilt and doubts and all kinds of questions. But it's easier if you have someone to share your grief with. And of course, it's not just the humans who grieve. Couple of days following Coco's passing our cats behaved very strangely: they pooped on the living room floor and in the shower (behaviour that is completely alien to our cats). And Vader (who was never buddy-buddy with Tiger) has now formed a kind of an alliance with Tiger and almost seems to be channeling Coco (especially during feeding times). Tiger seems depressed. I'm sure one day he will learn to live with the loss, we all will. And one thing is for sure: G's birthday will always be the day we think of Coco.

*** There is one thing I noticed about this, though, that bothers me. A week after Coco had passed, we had to go to a 50^th birthday party. Chatting to some people there, G’s birthday came up and after receiving a few congrats, G mentioned that his birthday hadn’t been the best of days imaginable and asked people not to press any further on the matter, as it’s all still a bit raw for us. To which one of the people in the group exclaimed, I hope nothing’s happened to any human beings in your life! Wow. What a thing to say. They all know that we have cats. It clearly can only come from someone who’s never considered pets family members, or equal with humans in any way. I recently saw an article where a musician talked about how the previous year had been a difficult one for his family because they lost their cat, who had been with them for 15 years. Some of the comments from the readers could make you lose faith in humanity! I was not prepared for cynicism instead of sympathy there, but that’s what seemed to prevail in those comments. It’s truly disheartening when people can’t empathize or understand empathizing with other species.

We have never considered our cats our (fur) babies; no, they aren’t in our life as  substitutes for human children. We are always fully conscious of the fact that they belong to a different species but that doesn’t mean that we should treat them any differently from any members of our own species. There is no need to anthropomorphize animals in order to treat them with the same respect we’d be willing to show our fellow humans. In fact, I  believe that one of the beautiful things about humans is our ability to accept and respect and care for other species as much as our own. Unfortunately it’s not a universal quality we have, seems that for many of us there’s still a long way to go.

PS. During that month, I was listening to Ronan O Snodaigh and Miles O'Reilly a lot. And somehow, instinctively, I felt that there was something very special about a song called The Beautiful Road. Now I have learnt that it was dedicated to a friend of Ronan's, with whom he'd had many long conversations and good times over the years, who had passed away after an illness. In the introduction to the video posted here below, Ronan says that he got very fond of his friend's voice over the years, and at the beginning and end of the video you hear his friend talking.

And now this song always reminds me of Coco. We were very fond of her voice.

May your loved ones always find their way back home. Step by step by stone, by merciful stone.