For Clementine 

We said goodbye to Clementine this weekend.
I haven't been able to talk.
So I wrote this for Clemmie.

Watching your last day with us tears my heart Clem.
But I am grateful to see you at the barn, keeping an eye on things, even as your breathing is labored and your purr only a tiny fraction of itself.
When we started fighting this thing I believed you would be the 1 in a million.
Because you’re the one in a million in every other way.
My daily side kick; more likely I was yours.
Yep, I was yours.
Somehow you found us, when little did we know that we’d been the ones who needed to be found.
I told you I’d be there for you, no matter what.
And every day since this damn diagnosis I’ve asked you ‘are you good?’ and you’ve told me you were.
Until now.
And I knew that the hardest part was to come.
The saying goodbye when there should be so much more.
But I will do right by you now, as I promised you.
And last night you spent outside.
Under the full moon, stars blazing brightly in the dark velvet sky after weeks of smoke finally cleared away as if for you.
A sky made for you.
Lit up by nature’s light; the better to see and patrol your 500’ circle of death.
I hope you caught a mouse and felt that primal perfection of instinct one last time.
Yesterday when I asked you, I asked a different question as I could see you were not good. Not by any means.
I asked you if it was time for me to let you go, and you said yes.
It tears my heart, but I honor you by doing the hard stuff too.
My prayer for you Clem is that your cat heart is as full as a cat’s heart can be.
Full of knowledge of how much you mean to us, full of love and fun and serial killing and cat life perfection.
Is it too much to ask the universe take you back peacefully, the gently waning moon lighting your way, stars winking like your aquamarine eyes, a thousand crickets singing their song?
I prayed that you may close your eyes in the cool of midnight and drift off softly, back to cat magic, but never too far away from our hearts.
But the universe was silent, so it was you and I who came full circle together.
To Clementine.
Thank you all for loving her and following her journey. She was the best cat in the world, and I'll fight anybody who thinks otherwise.
xoxo