Good bye my friend...until we meet again

Many, many moons ago on a cold and wet night, our cat Kay gave birth to several kittens out in the barn. She had chosen a good spot for her family but the rain came and began to leak under the floor boards where she was hiding her kittens.

As we rescued mother and kittens and began to dry them off, one little bit of a thing that looked like a drowned rat really puffed up when we dried her fur and the kids laughed and said she looked like dryer lint and the name stuck. Lint became part of our family and her best friend was my mom.

Momma was the only owner Lint ever really had as she owned the rest of us like most cats prefer. She would spend her days laying in Momma's lap or beside her chair and her nights were spent curled up at the bottom of Momma's bed. When Momma passed away, we almost lost Lint as well for she mourned along with the rest of us and we finally had to banish her from Momma's room.

Lint was a well traveled cat, she has been through several states and lived in 4, Connecticut, Maine, Tennessee and South Carolina. She has been snuck in fancy hotels and stayed in pet friendly places. She would ride in the car or truck with Frank and I looking out at the people and cars passing by and drew crowds of onlookers as we took her to the pet area of a rest stop on a leash! Oh the indignity of it all, she tolerated it, but just barely!

Once while up prowling the house in Maine she almost escaped into the wild through an open window when she managed to tear a hole in the screen. I caught her just in time and reached out and grabbed her. She must have thought the devil himself had a hold of her cause she bit the pure sh*t out of me. My brother Brad gave her a wide berth after that (seeing it took several months of med's to get my arm looking normal again)... I still bear the scars proudly.

Lately she has spent more and more time in Becki's room and it wasn't until I set down to write this that I realized it was really her room; her's and Momma's so long ago... it has finally come the time for Lint to pass on and we will do that with dignity, for she is a proud cat, a very loved cat and as I sit here crying, I am not ashamed for she was my friend, my confidant and my last thread to my Momma...

I only hope that when my time comes, I have a loved one by my side and my doctors have as much compassion as those at Dogwood Animal Hospital. Lint is home now, with my mom, Brad, her brother Alabaster and all those other beloved pets who have gone before us.

We buried her out under the oaks with a slab of Maine rock as a headstone; although I promised to bury her at Seven Pines I think she would have liked this spot. Godspeed Lint, Godspeed...