To our furry friends

It is with great sadness that I write today, at midnight last evening our old puss, Feival-Bob, named by my children when they were small, went to join his brother/ playmate Salem-Jim. Feival was just over fourteen years old, a country cat because we always lived deep in the country in farm villages miles from anywhere. He came to live with us when my ex husband moved to Spain and was unable to take the cat with him. We'd got Feival from my sister when her daughter was born, no my niece wasn't anything to do with the cats apart from she was born at the same time. My children grew up with him. Today the hardest part was taking him on his last journey to the vets.Then coming home after the healing service we attended to a home where there was something missing. The last time I felt like this was the day after my father in law died. Bless his heart, he was always worried if he died in the night that we wouldn't know what happened to him. I believe he hung on until we went in to do our night check on him before he slipped away, even though we were late to bed that night, and we had precious minutes with him to say what we needed to say before he just faded into the spirit world. Feival did much the same. I heard him coughing, which wasn't unusual because he had been so poorly, but he made another sound which wasn't usual and I went downstairs. I think as I got there he was passing, as I stroked his head he moved and his face quivered and I knew. I was able to tell him it was ok to leave us, that his time had come and I loved him, then he was still. Today there was a silent space where he used to be... how do you explain that ? He was a wonderful pet, tolerant, so friendly, always purring and a big part of all our lives. He took such a small space but that space is noticably empty now that he is gone. I miss him so much....
It is still hard even knowing what I know, that the spirit lives on. Despite my firm belief in life going on, the human part of me still grieves for the loss of someone that is important to me. Did I do enough? was I good enough, so many thoughts and questions. Then I got to being rational and thought that it doesn't matter what we think at any point, those are our emotions, our insecurities, our fears; what is important is the way we make other people think, our influence on the world around us. It all goes back to my favourite story about the pebble in the pool. If we scowl at others we give off negative vibes that recreate in the next person who comes in contact with the person we scowled at... So the same happens with a smile... we might brighten someone's day. Why cause a chain reaction of anger, misreableness, judgement by offering a scowl when a smile would send warmth and love and maybe change a whole day in a positive way for everyone we smile at...
So when I question whether we were good enough for our puss, I look at his love, his trust and his loyalty. He never questioned what mood we were in, he would come up and purr such a loud purr and just love us, no matter what. Ok most of it had to do with food but well that's cat nature! He still never judged us, he just accepted that we were there for him. Isn't it a shame that we as people cannot do the same, we have to give labels! Well Feival, lesson learned and I thank you for being my friend and companion, playmate to the children when they were small, the best listener in the world and the biggest purrer so that we knew you loved us too. We have a lot to learn from you my little furry friend, thank you so much for being a special part of our lives. Happy freedom and youth in the next world ...