My Taxi Is Gone

My darling boy. My silk brick.

My sweet snickerdoodles, who slept at my feet on the corner of my bed, or on top of me should the opportunity have presented itself. My darling tixanax who went wherever I went, including opening doors so he could let himself into the room I was in. My precious snickers who slept on the couch where he could see me if I was downstairs, and went running up the stairs if it looked like I was headed in that direction. My boy. My toothless wonder who nonetheless managed to catch birds on the balcony outside my bedroom, and then played with them in my bathroom till he let himself out and I could throw it away. My sweet kitty who had almost no voice, and would look at me and talk to me and I knew he was meowing at me because his mouth was moving.

I am going to miss my sweet Taxi cat something awful. There will be no more weight on my feet at night. There will be no more running up the stairs ahead of me with such visible excitement it never failed to make me smile. There will be no more rolling around and purring like a mad thing when I talked to him.

My heart is broken.

He was only 6 years old, and the cause of his sudden passing is a mystery. His heart just stopped. I am grateful to some extent because I honestly expected to battle diabetes or some such in his old age brought on by his FeLV.
Not half an hour before that he had crept past me on the kitchen floor with his eye on some birds on the back lawn. And then he was gone.

We're having him cremated and I will get his ashes back in a little wooden box.