family
Blue's Clues, Life & Death, and Aidan's Favorite Cat
19/05/08 21:43
Usually,
Brie and I drive separately to work. I drive Aidan to preschool on
the way to my early class (zero hour, for those of you who
understand Cienega High School) and Brie takes Caleb to the daycare
at Empire High School. After school, I proceed to my supervision of
Pantano's Long-Term Suspension program, and Brie takes both boys
home.
This week was different. I'm glad it was.
Finals week at Cienega means that zero hour is finished, and the long-term suspension program is over for the year. Monday, I slept an hour later than I usually do, and rose knowing that we could have a nice family morning, coupled with riding together to work - saving gas, of course; a very important thing nowadays. The flip side to this is that we were also able to drive home together. I like picking up Aidan from preschool, and I hardly ever get to do so. He runs across the playground to me, shouting "There's my DAD! LOOK! There's my DAD!" We give each other a big hug, and we move on as I try to edge him toward the car and he, in turn, tries to edge me toward seeing whatever he made that day in preschool.
On this particular Monday, we had to stop at Safeway on the way home to pick up oatmeal for the boys' breakfasts and one or two other things that I can't remember and probably weren't all that important in the first place. We decided that it would be easier for everyone (and faster - we were HUNGRY) if I just ran inside, threw the items in a cart, and rushed my way through the checkout line. Brie decided to let the kids watch something in the DVD player while waiting in the car, and Blue's Clues was the winner.
Thank God for Blue's Clues that day. Really.
Blue the Dog allowed Brie and I to have a real, live adult conversation on the way home. The mood was cheerful, and Brie was grateful to have me there to help out with dinner that night, since she normally has to manage the kids and dinner until I get home each night around six. Cheerful, that is, until we turned the corner into our neighborhood and saw Fizzie laying in the yard, two houses down from our own.
We got Fizzie (short for Fizzgig, for those of you familiar with the Dark Crystal) last summer as an adorable kitten, part of a pair of kittens we adopted from the Pima Animal Rescue Center...or whatever it's called. He and his "spiritual kitten brother," Bandit proved to be welcome additions to our household. Aidan and Caleb giggled for hours, playing with the kittens, and often had to be dragged to bed away from them. Fizzie immediately forged a bond with Aidan, as they are both cuddly, playful, and somewhat obstinate. Fizzie would actually meow loudly outside of Aidan's door at night, upset at being parted from his Boy. Once or twice, I found Fizzie and Aidan sleeping together, and they could frequently be found snuggling on the couch or chasing one another around the house.
Thank God for Blue's Clues. Brie and I looked away, her hand clapped over her mouth and my eyes staring grimly ahead as I pulled into our garage, two houses down. The kids had seen nothing, intent on watching Blue and Joe caper about and discussing shapes on the small screen, oblivious to the greater drama now playing itself out in our home. She gathered the kids and brought them inside, as I looked around in the garage for redemption, but found only an old towel and a plastic bag. Gripping them in my whitened fingers, I walked down the sidewalk back the way we had come.
One night, I found Aidan sitting on the couch with Fizzie in his lap. It was about 2 AM or so. He told me that Fizzie had woken him with his meowing. I shooed the little Siamese away and sent Aidan back to bed. Brie and I brainstormed over how to keep Fizzie quiet at night. She suggested the garage. I imagined cats pooping in dark corners. I suggested our room. She cited Fizzie's tendency to play loudly and meow. Not a quiet cat. We tried locking all three cats in the laundry room at night with the food and the cat box. Didn't go so well, as you might imagine. I started to find Fizzie in the bathroom in the morning, apparently locked in there by Aidan in the middle of the night. A solution needed to be found. My son needed sleep. We all needed peace of mind. We let him outside.
He loved it. And so it goes. Fizzie leapt on the wall. Fizzie laid in the sun. Fizzie chased butterflies. Fizzie hunted lizards. Fizzie was happy. Fizzie slept at night on a chair on the porch. Aidan slept through the night and played with his favorite kitty friend during the day. Brie and I worried now and then, but lots of people have outdoor cats, right?
I approached the Siamese cat, seemingly asleep in our neighbor's front yard on the corner. "Chht, chht," I said, making the universal sound for cats that says "Come here and play with me." He didn't move. His eyes were open. His ears were bent back. Much as I didn't want it to be, it was Fizzie. Dead in the yard. Flies buzzed around his head, and I swatted at them in frustration. I stroked his fur, and for just a moment I thought he would move - and then he didn't. A friend who jogs by our home each morning told me later that she had seen him there, but didn't realize he was our cat. My son's favorite cat, lying among the rocks of my neighbor's yard in the hot Arizona sun, all day long. Poor, poor kitty.
There are some details regarding picking him up that I have only spoken of once, and will likely never do so again.
Aidan had dealt with death before. In December of 2006, our 14 year-old cat Kirby had died of old age and kidney failure. It was relatively sudden, but still took a week before we allowed the vet to put him to sleep. It was hard, and we read Aidan stories like Cat Heaven and Goodbye Mog in an effort to help him cope. He was only 3 1/2, and didn't EXACTLY get it, but he understood that Kirby was now in Kitty Heaven and was laying outside in a sunbeam and snuggling with God somewhere. Aidan is nearly five now, and had bonded with Fizzie like with no other.
The walk back to the house, holding my son's best kitty friend in my arms, took five million years. Brie came outside to see him. I didn't unfold the towel entirely - the wound was underneath, and I didn't want her to see whatever had transpired between the heat of the day and the walk back to the house in the wound in his fuzzy little kitty belly - but she was able to see his head. She told me that Rebecca was coming to our home to pick up the boys and bring them back to her house to play with Little Aidan and that they had ordered pizza. Rod, normally prone to staying at work until he was done, was speeding on his way home to pick up the pizza in order to help. I brought Fizzie around back so that he would remain unseen until Brie and I figured out what to do.
We couldn't tell Aidan tonight. We just couldn't. We had four more days left until we could be home with him. What do you say? "Your kitty is dead, but we don't have time to discuss it because you need to take a bath and go to bed and go to preschool in the morning"? We decided to wait until Saturday. Aidan and Caleb went happily to the Carriers' house and we went to the backyard to figure out what to do. He couldn't go in the garbage. We couldn't afford to cremate him. It had to be a burial, it had to be now, and it had to be in our back yard.
Arizona dirt sucks. I had to use a pickaxe every five minutes just to break through the next layer. We chose a nice spot near the wall where we wouldn't need to dig in the future and where he would lie undisturbed by plant roots or drainage. I dug. I dug. I dug. I went a good 3 1/2 feet - not bad, considering the hard desert scrabble I was digging through. Beyond that, I could not go; I simply had to hope that it was deep enough to keep him from......anything. I made the surreal decision to cover him in a first layer of poured QuikCrete, in the hopes that the concrete would set under the earth and keep the scent away and thwart any diggers.
I told Brie to go inside - I wanted to be sure that she didn't see anything she shouldn't see while I arranged Fizzie at the bottom of the hole.
He looked so content, like he was taking a nap. I still felt frozen. In shock. Protective.
Brie came out for the burial. She had two pictures of Aidan and some flowers that he had picked that weekend. And his soccer shirt. Hell, he had outgrown it anyway. I covered his body with the shirt like a little blanket and placed the photos and the flowers inside, and poured the concrete. Then I picked up the shovel, and the facade melted.
Aidan told Brie a couple of days ago that he had had a dream that Fizzie had run toward the street and that he had shouted at the kitty to get out of the street. Odd.
There is nothing in the world to help someone open up and grieve than picking up a shovel and burying a loved one by yourself. I sobbed. I apologized. Brie and I were both crying. What do you say or do when this was a death that could have been PREVENTED??? If we had stuck to our mutual upbringing and our desire to have only indoor cats, Fizzie would still be alive. No....it had been easier to simply let him outside.
We went to the Carriers and picked up our children. And so it goes.
This morning, I read Aidan "The Fall of Freddie the Leaf." If you have ever had to deal with death, this is definitely the story to read, child or adult. You can find it in full text using Google. I recommend it - very touching, comforting, but HONEST in its depiction of people's fears regarding death. I think he understood. He liked hearing it. We discussed it.
Then came the hard part.
Brie asked him why he thought he hadn't seen Fizzie lately as we looked at a picture of him on her computer. He thought about it, and said he didn't know. She told him that he had gotten out a few days ago, and that a car had hit him. Aidan's voice went a little high-pitched as he asked if Fizzie had died. Brie said yes. Aidan's tears began to fall down his cheeks as he argued, as he told us that he didn't want Fizzie to die, that he was going to miss him, and his tears were echoed by our own as Caleb blissfully scribbled with crayons three feet away. We rocked, and we hugged, and we cried together, and Aidan said that he was more sad than he has ever been, and cried out that he would never again be able to hug or pet his kitty, and we all cried harder. Try dealing with the death of a loved one - and then try explaining it to your beloved preschooler. We talked about life and death, about renewal, about kitties, about kitty heaven, about God, about souls, about the importance of keeping kitties inside, about dreams about kitties in the street - yes, he remembered his dream - but most importantly, we talked about love. Love for kitties. Love for mom and dad. Most of all, about love for Aidan.
Thank you, Rebecca and Rod, for being good friends when we needed it.
Thank you, Mom and Joe and Sharon, for valued advice.
Thank you, Brie, for being the best wife and mom a guy could ask for.
Thank you Aidan, for loving so much and so hard and grieving so honestly.
Thank you, Fizzie, for your young and fuzzy life, full of snuggles and meows and lizards, but most of all for loving my son.
I'm sorry.
And so it goes.
This week was different. I'm glad it was.
Finals week at Cienega means that zero hour is finished, and the long-term suspension program is over for the year. Monday, I slept an hour later than I usually do, and rose knowing that we could have a nice family morning, coupled with riding together to work - saving gas, of course; a very important thing nowadays. The flip side to this is that we were also able to drive home together. I like picking up Aidan from preschool, and I hardly ever get to do so. He runs across the playground to me, shouting "There's my DAD! LOOK! There's my DAD!" We give each other a big hug, and we move on as I try to edge him toward the car and he, in turn, tries to edge me toward seeing whatever he made that day in preschool.
On this particular Monday, we had to stop at Safeway on the way home to pick up oatmeal for the boys' breakfasts and one or two other things that I can't remember and probably weren't all that important in the first place. We decided that it would be easier for everyone (and faster - we were HUNGRY) if I just ran inside, threw the items in a cart, and rushed my way through the checkout line. Brie decided to let the kids watch something in the DVD player while waiting in the car, and Blue's Clues was the winner.
Thank God for Blue's Clues that day. Really.
Blue the Dog allowed Brie and I to have a real, live adult conversation on the way home. The mood was cheerful, and Brie was grateful to have me there to help out with dinner that night, since she normally has to manage the kids and dinner until I get home each night around six. Cheerful, that is, until we turned the corner into our neighborhood and saw Fizzie laying in the yard, two houses down from our own.
We got Fizzie (short for Fizzgig, for those of you familiar with the Dark Crystal) last summer as an adorable kitten, part of a pair of kittens we adopted from the Pima Animal Rescue Center...or whatever it's called. He and his "spiritual kitten brother," Bandit proved to be welcome additions to our household. Aidan and Caleb giggled for hours, playing with the kittens, and often had to be dragged to bed away from them. Fizzie immediately forged a bond with Aidan, as they are both cuddly, playful, and somewhat obstinate. Fizzie would actually meow loudly outside of Aidan's door at night, upset at being parted from his Boy. Once or twice, I found Fizzie and Aidan sleeping together, and they could frequently be found snuggling on the couch or chasing one another around the house.
Thank God for Blue's Clues. Brie and I looked away, her hand clapped over her mouth and my eyes staring grimly ahead as I pulled into our garage, two houses down. The kids had seen nothing, intent on watching Blue and Joe caper about and discussing shapes on the small screen, oblivious to the greater drama now playing itself out in our home. She gathered the kids and brought them inside, as I looked around in the garage for redemption, but found only an old towel and a plastic bag. Gripping them in my whitened fingers, I walked down the sidewalk back the way we had come.
One night, I found Aidan sitting on the couch with Fizzie in his lap. It was about 2 AM or so. He told me that Fizzie had woken him with his meowing. I shooed the little Siamese away and sent Aidan back to bed. Brie and I brainstormed over how to keep Fizzie quiet at night. She suggested the garage. I imagined cats pooping in dark corners. I suggested our room. She cited Fizzie's tendency to play loudly and meow. Not a quiet cat. We tried locking all three cats in the laundry room at night with the food and the cat box. Didn't go so well, as you might imagine. I started to find Fizzie in the bathroom in the morning, apparently locked in there by Aidan in the middle of the night. A solution needed to be found. My son needed sleep. We all needed peace of mind. We let him outside.
He loved it. And so it goes. Fizzie leapt on the wall. Fizzie laid in the sun. Fizzie chased butterflies. Fizzie hunted lizards. Fizzie was happy. Fizzie slept at night on a chair on the porch. Aidan slept through the night and played with his favorite kitty friend during the day. Brie and I worried now and then, but lots of people have outdoor cats, right?
I approached the Siamese cat, seemingly asleep in our neighbor's front yard on the corner. "Chht, chht," I said, making the universal sound for cats that says "Come here and play with me." He didn't move. His eyes were open. His ears were bent back. Much as I didn't want it to be, it was Fizzie. Dead in the yard. Flies buzzed around his head, and I swatted at them in frustration. I stroked his fur, and for just a moment I thought he would move - and then he didn't. A friend who jogs by our home each morning told me later that she had seen him there, but didn't realize he was our cat. My son's favorite cat, lying among the rocks of my neighbor's yard in the hot Arizona sun, all day long. Poor, poor kitty.
There are some details regarding picking him up that I have only spoken of once, and will likely never do so again.
Aidan had dealt with death before. In December of 2006, our 14 year-old cat Kirby had died of old age and kidney failure. It was relatively sudden, but still took a week before we allowed the vet to put him to sleep. It was hard, and we read Aidan stories like Cat Heaven and Goodbye Mog in an effort to help him cope. He was only 3 1/2, and didn't EXACTLY get it, but he understood that Kirby was now in Kitty Heaven and was laying outside in a sunbeam and snuggling with God somewhere. Aidan is nearly five now, and had bonded with Fizzie like with no other.
The walk back to the house, holding my son's best kitty friend in my arms, took five million years. Brie came outside to see him. I didn't unfold the towel entirely - the wound was underneath, and I didn't want her to see whatever had transpired between the heat of the day and the walk back to the house in the wound in his fuzzy little kitty belly - but she was able to see his head. She told me that Rebecca was coming to our home to pick up the boys and bring them back to her house to play with Little Aidan and that they had ordered pizza. Rod, normally prone to staying at work until he was done, was speeding on his way home to pick up the pizza in order to help. I brought Fizzie around back so that he would remain unseen until Brie and I figured out what to do.
We couldn't tell Aidan tonight. We just couldn't. We had four more days left until we could be home with him. What do you say? "Your kitty is dead, but we don't have time to discuss it because you need to take a bath and go to bed and go to preschool in the morning"? We decided to wait until Saturday. Aidan and Caleb went happily to the Carriers' house and we went to the backyard to figure out what to do. He couldn't go in the garbage. We couldn't afford to cremate him. It had to be a burial, it had to be now, and it had to be in our back yard.
Arizona dirt sucks. I had to use a pickaxe every five minutes just to break through the next layer. We chose a nice spot near the wall where we wouldn't need to dig in the future and where he would lie undisturbed by plant roots or drainage. I dug. I dug. I dug. I went a good 3 1/2 feet - not bad, considering the hard desert scrabble I was digging through. Beyond that, I could not go; I simply had to hope that it was deep enough to keep him from......anything. I made the surreal decision to cover him in a first layer of poured QuikCrete, in the hopes that the concrete would set under the earth and keep the scent away and thwart any diggers.
I told Brie to go inside - I wanted to be sure that she didn't see anything she shouldn't see while I arranged Fizzie at the bottom of the hole.
He looked so content, like he was taking a nap. I still felt frozen. In shock. Protective.
Brie came out for the burial. She had two pictures of Aidan and some flowers that he had picked that weekend. And his soccer shirt. Hell, he had outgrown it anyway. I covered his body with the shirt like a little blanket and placed the photos and the flowers inside, and poured the concrete. Then I picked up the shovel, and the facade melted.
Aidan told Brie a couple of days ago that he had had a dream that Fizzie had run toward the street and that he had shouted at the kitty to get out of the street. Odd.
There is nothing in the world to help someone open up and grieve than picking up a shovel and burying a loved one by yourself. I sobbed. I apologized. Brie and I were both crying. What do you say or do when this was a death that could have been PREVENTED??? If we had stuck to our mutual upbringing and our desire to have only indoor cats, Fizzie would still be alive. No....it had been easier to simply let him outside.
We went to the Carriers and picked up our children. And so it goes.
This morning, I read Aidan "The Fall of Freddie the Leaf." If you have ever had to deal with death, this is definitely the story to read, child or adult. You can find it in full text using Google. I recommend it - very touching, comforting, but HONEST in its depiction of people's fears regarding death. I think he understood. He liked hearing it. We discussed it.
Then came the hard part.
Brie asked him why he thought he hadn't seen Fizzie lately as we looked at a picture of him on her computer. He thought about it, and said he didn't know. She told him that he had gotten out a few days ago, and that a car had hit him. Aidan's voice went a little high-pitched as he asked if Fizzie had died. Brie said yes. Aidan's tears began to fall down his cheeks as he argued, as he told us that he didn't want Fizzie to die, that he was going to miss him, and his tears were echoed by our own as Caleb blissfully scribbled with crayons three feet away. We rocked, and we hugged, and we cried together, and Aidan said that he was more sad than he has ever been, and cried out that he would never again be able to hug or pet his kitty, and we all cried harder. Try dealing with the death of a loved one - and then try explaining it to your beloved preschooler. We talked about life and death, about renewal, about kitties, about kitty heaven, about God, about souls, about the importance of keeping kitties inside, about dreams about kitties in the street - yes, he remembered his dream - but most importantly, we talked about love. Love for kitties. Love for mom and dad. Most of all, about love for Aidan.
Thank you, Rebecca and Rod, for being good friends when we needed it.
Thank you, Mom and Joe and Sharon, for valued advice.
Thank you, Brie, for being the best wife and mom a guy could ask for.
Thank you Aidan, for loving so much and so hard and grieving so honestly.
Thank you, Fizzie, for your young and fuzzy life, full of snuggles and meows and lizards, but most of all for loving my son.
I'm sorry.
And so it goes.
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