Our Cats

On Oct 28, 2017 we adopted Apple, a cute male domestic shorthair kitten, two months old. He began life at our house enjoying a somewhat cloistered life behind our refrigerator.

He is of course much larger now, and yet he seems to have retained that absurd silliness that captures our hearts.

On the other hand, he can be quite infuriating. Once, while trying to catch him to take him to the vet, I fell over and got some significant bruises. But, he is still cute.

Though we only have one cat now, there was a time when we had two cats, Claudius and Caesar. I was on a Roman history binge at the time I named them.

Sadly, at the end of January 2011 we had to say goodbye to Claudius, who had been getting sicker for quite some time. Then, during the fall of 2015 we also had to say goodbye to Caesar. I miss them both. They can be seen as they were in this clip from YouTube.

At the time of Claudius’ death I wrote a poem about him.

FLY AWAY

Fly away my little friend;
With purrs you warmed my heart.
You snuggled soft upon my lap,
But now we have to part.

Fly away my little friend,
A friend I loved so dear.
You never spoke, you never talked,
Yet your voice I still do hear.

Little darling, little friend,
I am grateful for the days
You shared my home and touched my heart,
In soft mysterious ways.

Patrick A Rose
Feb. 1, 2011.

Claudius. 2000-2011.