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It was not the first time I had assisted in the euthanasia of a pet, but I had to be reminded of the proper hold to restrain the cat's head, and how to roll foreleg skin to make the vein pop up.
"Under the head like this, and roll it with your thumb like this," the veterinarian said somewhat impatiently.
I did it correctly, and the vein popped up. Bella, unwell and very old in cat years, flinched slightly as the hypodermic needle slipped in. There was no struggle. The solution was only partially injected and Grizabella was gone.
Grandson Lamppost Head had asked to be present for the event. He and his brother, The 747, were standing very close. The 747 gave a small exclamation of surprise at the suddenness with which life left the old cat.
"You see how fast it can happen," my wife Honey said. "Life can end just like that. It's a good lesson."
Though The 747 was the one who startled, we knew it was Lamppost Head who felt it more. He is the one with tender feelings, and he had become very fond of Bella over the past three months.
A year older than his brother, Lamppost Head matriculated from the grade school they had attended together. In middle school now, he gets dropped off near our house and spends the afternoon hours at our house until his mother picks him up after work. Grumpy, annoying, old Bella was always available, and always needy. After Lamppost Head finished his homework, he would sit for an hour, watching cartoons and stroking Bella's bony old back.
It was around the end of his high school days that son Worshrag found Grizabella, a stray barely past kittenhood. He begged to keep her, promising that when he had a place of his own he would take her, which everyone knew would never happen.
Bella was largely a failure as a lap cat. She did it, but preferred to stand up. Do you know how annoying it is to have a lap cat who insists on standing up?
She had a talent for inserting herself between me and the book or newspaper I was reading, and suddenly rubbing her face against my wife's hand as she was writing a check or holding a hot cup of coffee.
Cursed with a permanently gloomy personality, Bella had a gravelly yeow that was so painful to the ear that it was funny. I admit to annoying her just to hear that miserable "woe is me" vocalization.
Amazingly for a cat that weighed all of three pounds, she was fearlessness when dogs were brought into the house, while the other cats ran and hid. She ignored dogs, walking past as if they weren't there. If they came too close, a quick slash across the nose left them terrified of her. We weren't sure if she was brave or just didn't care anymore.
We have had many, many cats. If we could have chosen long life for any of them, Grizabella would have been near the end of the list. When her time finally came, neither Honey nor I were especially sad. We postponed it until after Christmas, and let the family know so everyone could say their goodbyes if they cared to.
The night before the event Shark found Lamppost Head crying on her bed.
"I hugged him and he began sobbing," she told us. "He asked me not to say 'cat, family, death or dying' for the next two weeks."
It was the boys' idea to bury Bella in the woods, in an honored place beside the grave of Beaky, who had been family turkey vulture to the Millers. I dug the grave in advance.
Shark's boys came with me as I carried the body, wrapped in an old white towel. I handed the little bundle to Lamppost Head, and he laid her gently in the grave. We each tossed in a handful of earth, as I told the boys was customary, before I filled in the hole. I drove in a stick to mark the location, with a promise to place a suitable marker later.
"At least," Shark said, "Bella was loved by someone."
(Fred Miller's third book, "A Dead Carp on Shadyside Ave." is available locally at Calcutta Giant Eagle, Pottery City Antique Mall, Museum of Ceramics, Frank's Pastries, Davis Bros. pharmacies and the Old Ft. Steuben gift shop.)