Watered Whiskers

Being a pluviophile, the first warm spring rain is my favorite time of the year. Once I step out the door of my house and smell the fresh, clean air and the scent of water on the black top, I feel free, recharged, and relaxed. If it were my choice I would take that moment and package it into a bottle I could wake up and smell every day...but not today. I have to get into my beat up SUV that for some reason has the smell of old wet gym socks rather than fresh spring rain.

Moving the car seat back to a position that doesn't make me taste the steering wheel, I heard a small mew. I have always been told the stories of people starting their car and finding an animal on the engine block, so I quickly popped the hood to check. Even though the sound didn't emanate from the engine, I did see a small, skinny, wet, white and black fur ball shaking under the engine. I slowly moved to the ground and coaxed what is clearly at cat from that point out from under the engine.

Taking the cat back into the house, I retrieved a towel to dry off the kitten and as soon as the sound of the cat made it to my children's ears, they all came rushing down the stairs. Unfortunately, I had to go to work and leave the cat with my wife and kids to try to bring back to good health.

When I returned, the cat seemed to be better off than me. He had his own bed, was being fed a combination of kitten food and a little milk because they had no idea how old the cat was, and was laying in the lap of my youngest asleep. "We named him Whiskers!" she exclaims with hushed tones while trying not to wake the kitten.

Just like that, we now had a family pet. I never really wanted a family pet because it required constant care, their lifespans were always short, and they often did things like spin the toilet paper off of the roll for fun. I had a pet in the past and it never panned out well for me. The heartbreak when they die, or watching the deterioration of their health were always a deterrent for me. But this time, it was the pet for the small ones. So I laid down the ground rules about cleaning the litter box and making sure he is fed, and we had a new member of the family.

As the cat birthdays and landmark changes in life passed by, Whiskers and I gained our own habits. For a cat, he was sometimes dog like. He would stand looking at the window when it was time for me to come home from work. He would mew when I was outside and he wasn't. But the one thing that tied it all together was when it rained. Whiskers and I would sit next to the open window looking outside, and smelling the warm, wet air. After a few minutes, he would curl up on my lap, and purr himself to sleep.

In his later years, he would join me in the bathroom every morning so he could take a shower with me. It was that same warm, wet air that bonded us as feline to feline's human.

The hopping into the tub to shower turned into, me helping him into the shower. The helping him into the shower turned into me carrying him to the bathroom. Each day, his health declined until his passing.

Whiskers is buried under that same broken SUV we found him, behind a garage. Over the 12 years we were fortunate enough to have him, his life taught me a tremendous amount about unconditional love, about helping loved ones, and about death... so much that when family members followed over the years, I was better prepared. His life taught my children that pets can help with heartbreak, can provide an audience for those stage performances, and can provide an emotional balance... that family pet is as calming and as a fresh as warm, spring rain.