A Sad Day

Today was not a good day. Our beloved klutzy cat , Percy, passed away. He was 6 1/2 years old, but he is the only cat that Meghan remembers. He has been with us since she was 2. We are not sure what really happened - it is really sudden and a surprise. I must say that over the past week he had spent lots of quality time with us bring even more affectionate than normal which will make our memories very sweet. I thought that maybe I would tell some stories about Percy so that those of you that never had your life enriched by knowing him will know how sweet an animal he was.

I guess the best place to start is recall how he came to be with us. Percy had some how gotten to a very busy road and scared he ran in to the store Alan was running at the time in Georgia. Alan took him in and placed him in the back hoping someone would come looking for him. Alan called me when he was leaving work to tell me that if the kitten had not been claimed by close he was going to bring it home. Knowing that the kitten was coming home with us that night, I asked Alan about the kitten. The first questions I had were is he short haired or long haired and male or female. Alan's replay was that he was short haired and male. Percy turned out to be long hair and male. Percy rode home that night on the front seat of the car between Alan and I. Later that night, Percy cuddled himself firmly into my heart when he lay next to me using my arm as a pillow.

Because we wanted Meghan to feel she was a part of this whole process of bringing Percy into the family, we let her pick his name. At the time, Meghan was very into Veggie Tales. For those of you unfamiliar with Veggie Tales, it is a cartoon through which Bible stories are acted out by animated vegetables. Check out http://bigidea.com/ for more Veggie Tales info. Those of you in the know already recognize the character that Meghan named Percy after. Yes. Percy the Pea.

Percy moved from Georgia to Florida with us and handled the move in his normal laid back way. He traveled alongside Meghan in the backseat on our memorable ride to Florida. Percy handled the a/c belt I lost on the car with a whole lot more grace than I did.

Percy fell in love with the octagan window in our house. Percy perched there for hours that sometimes turned into days. The windows around the house was what Alan referred to as kitty tv. When he was ready for a new channel he would switch to another window; however, the show from the octagon window was always his favorite channel.

Percy proved to be the most amazingly klutzy animal. He would fall off the couch, out of the window, off the bed or whatever he was sitting or laying upon. He would always get back up and look around as if to see if anyone noticed. Fortunately he finally gave up on it but he used to try to sleep on the headboard of our bed and during the night he would fall off and usually would land on either my head or Alan's. His falls were so frequent from the octagon window that we replaced the table under the windowwith something higher so he would not fall as far and something without glass so he would not fall through it. Percy broke at least two lamps in is falls from the octagon window but I could never get truly upset with him.

My favorite Percy story was the first Easter we were here in Florida and decided to color Easter eggs. Percy wanted to prticipate in the process as eagerly as any human child. We kept moving him away from the area. As we were finishing the eggs, Percy got up on the table and lay down in the middle of the dyes on the table. When we finally got him to move, the fur on his belly was colored in all the colors but most predominantly purple. That Easter we not only had colored eggs, but a colored cat as well. He kept his pastel colors for several weeks as they eventually faded away. After this, purple seemed to be his favorite color.


He spent the weeks of my enforced rest period following my surgery at my side. The first week or so I slept in the living room on the couch. Percy did not truly understand why he could not lay on my stomach and woukd try everyday all over again. He was by side and sat with me through movie after movie, website after website, book after book and even Meghan's science project.

Percy will be sorely missed as member of our family. He was sweetest most laid back animal you would ever want to encounter. Some cats seem to get attached to one person in the house but Percy picked all three of us.