This morning I woke up with no alarm right around 6 a.m. and my first thought was, "At this time yesterday, I was with Pea, petting her for the last time and hearing her purr and meow." Right before rushing her to the ER. I hit the snooze button a couple times yesterday morning before I got out of bed. I had set my alarm for 5:30, and I wish I'd popped up then. I would have had a few more minutes with her.
But I am so thankful that we had a transport leaving early in the morning or else I would have woken up later and she would have already been gone. I wouldn't have gotten to say goodbye to her and I wouldn't have had any idea what happened.
I didn't want to get up this morning yet, and I just had this overwhelming feeling of hollowness. I stayed in bed and tried to go back to sleep, and when I did I ended having one of those dreams that just seemed so real. I was walking through some amazing house, and it was like it was mine but the rooms were gorgeous and it was huge and beautifully decorated. When I went into each room, it was like I was trying to focus harder, not believing that was my room. And I'd blink and it would become a real room in my house (like it looks now) for a moment. It was like something or someone was walking me through this gorgeous place to show me.
And maybe it sounds silly, but I just had such a peaceful feeling that it was Sweet Pea showing me that where she is now is a beautiful, wonderful place. And that there is still a piece of my place with her there. I don't even know how much I believe in any of this stuff, but I really felt better, and I slept soundly for another couple hours after.
And then when I finally woke up, I only made two bowls of food and then sat in Pea's bathroom for a while holding her little pillow and just cried. I will probably always associate the smell of the Airwick "Trimming the Tree" plug-in that I had in there with Pea. It'll always smell like her room.
A ton of times yesterday and a few times already this morning, I just like saying her name out loud, because I don't want to lose how I say it. I've said it in the car, at home, I said goodnight to her last night and good morning to her today, talking to the couch where she'd normally be meatloafed then.
It took me forever to change out of my clothes and take a shower after losing her yesterday, because her fur was on my shirt and I didn't want to wash it. It's folded on my bathroom counter still. I'm not sure how long I'll leave it there before I finally do.
I have no idea what to do with her stuff. It's not like she had a lot of stuff, but her hidey bed I bought her because I knew it would make her feel safe and the toys that I gave her that she never played with but were always there with her, the fleece bed with the towel on it still -- I don't want to move any of it.
I remembered this morning that I had bought her a pretty pink collar with a pretty pink flower on it a few weeks ago. I thought it was very "Sweet Pea" like the actual sweet pea flower. I didn't know if she'd ever let me put a collar on her, but I thought if she did, she would just look beautiful in it. It's in a basket in my kitchen.
Her Christmas stocking will stay up. With the pretty pink "P" pin that I bought to put on the white part of it.
Last night I looked at my wrist where I have a scar from her. It's a line under my paw print tattoo from a pretty good scratch that she graced me with when I was trying to put a harness on her before flying with her to Pittsburgh back in October. She did NOT want to wear that thing, and she won. She didn't, but she did leave me with a few marks to remind me never to try that stunt again. In the past couple weeks, I've been putting scar cream on it to try and fade it, because I wanted my paw tattoo to not have ugly marks around it. I'm not putting that on anymore. A mark from Pea by my paw tattoo is perfect. It's what that paw is all about, now that I think about it and it adds to it, not takes away from it like I thought before.
I've just been remembering a lot of things about Pea. I've loved her for years as my parking lot kitty before bringing her home. When I was having a sad time, I'd go to the parking lot just to hang out with her. There was a period where I can't remember what I was sad about, but what I do remember is waking up early on those weekend mornings, going to Dunkin Donuts to buy coffee and breakfast and then taking it over to the parking lot to eat it with Sweet Pea. I'd sit on one of the parking curbs and eat while she circled around me and rubbed my legs and back and arms, all the while with her tail straight up and happy like it always was. It was her that I went to be with then for comfort, even though there were other kitties there also.
I just can't believe she's gone. I guess it was better for her that it was very fast and that she was completely fine the day and night before. We were learning that she had something wrong that we couldn't fix, and I knew that eventually I would have to say goodbye. I didn't know how long she had, but I knew that I'd be caring for her whenever she would have started to get sick and show signs, and that we might have a hard time coming up eventually one day. I guess I'm glad that she didn't have to go through that. It was easier for her, but harder for me. Too soon and too fast is what I've been saying over and over again.
We didn't even get to do one official "Three Cats Thursday" after I finally admitted to myself that she was mine.
I promise not to make this a sad blog for long, but I really feel I can share these things with you all and you'll understand. And it helps me to write. So thank you all. And thank you for all the help with her bills yesterday. I can't express enough how that makes me feel. Thank you for sharing Pea Heart with me.
Here is Pea being a happy, wiggly girl on my couch not too long ago. She was so happy to be inside.
I also uploaded a couple other videos if you want to see. There's one of
Moo stalking her around the house (that I use a bad word at the end, but it's so appropriate!) and another one of a
live #peawatch in action.
Thanks, everyone. Tomorrow we'll go back to cute videos and happy Cute.
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