On June 25th of last month, I made the hardest visit to a vet that I had had to make up to that time.

On that morning, I let go of Chayya and sent her to rest and peace.

Chayya was my 15 year-old feisty fuzzball of a kitty, and she was the first cat I got back in 2009 after losing my first pet, period- Ishqa, another black feline- the year prior. Chayya was a pound kitten when I got her, and she grew up to be a beautiful and an active and vocal little girl.

Kitty Chayya

After I got her, I ended up feeling like I was gone a lot, and I got her a “playmate” from the pound that I introduced to her a bit early, and she walloped him immediately. He got his revenge by giving her ringworm a week or so later.

In time, the two warmed up to each other and became inseparable. Shukriya, her playmate cat bro, was large and mellow; she was always a little antsy and active. Together, they were good for each other.

Chayya was first an apartment cat, and then earned time in a house after a number of years.

She was loving. She liked to talk to me if she was upset or wanted anything. She always wanted to be near me, or on my lap, or when sitting by me, she would extend a front leg and set her paw on my arm, just to touch me. She had the softest fur I have ever felt. If she wasn’t on my lap, she was on the seat of the last chair I had been on. She brought me warm and comfort and was easy to take care of for the most part.

In her later years, her kidneys started giving her problems, until at a vet appointment in January of this year, I learned she was in hard straits with kidney disease. She quit eating at that time until I got some interdiction from a vet, and she bounced back a bit. She got waterboarded several times a week for the last few months of her life, but she ate well despite her condition. It was hard to see her waste over that time, shedding weight from that disease. In the last week she looked small and miserable, and my heart hurt watching her failing in the end. Dealing with issues related to Po in her last weeks, I knew yet she was on her way out, and I focused on time with her the last few days.

In the end, she was on my lap.

I found a quote the day she left me that I put on Facebook, that is worth also posting here.

“How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.”
– Winnie The Pooh

She was just some cat, but she was my little cat, and she helped me to love more, and helped me to practice being responsible. Without kids of my own, these animals helped to know a little bit about what parenting must be like.

I used to chant “Ch-ch-ch-chayya!” when I’d come home from somewhere and want to get her attention. She may not have liked it, but I did- because I always looked forward to it bringing her to the front door area to visit me.

After she was gone, I did get a small vail of her fur and a few whiskers, as well as a press of her paw prints on a plaque. Mementos of that lovely lady.

I love you and will miss you, my sweet little girl.