A Memorial

You know how they say a dog is a man’s best friend. Well, they obviously never met my family. Sure, we love dogs – even had two at various times over the years for a short period. However, cats, they are just a different story for us.

Growing up, I cannot remember a time we did not have a cat around the house. I was around two years old (at least that is what I have been told) when Max came into our lives. In his younger days, he was a fiery little guy. I don’t remember very much considering I was so young, but there aren’t a lot of memories as a child that don’t involve him. He really was my first sibling, at least for the four years he was around before Cearra was born.

Some of the things I love most about Max are his loyalty, his sensitivity, and his authority. It seems funny giving an animal such human characteristics, but I know no other way to put it. I remember nights when I would make sure he was in my room to sleep and practically trapped him under the covers to stay. After a while, I never had to force him. He was just there. I knew that if something ever broke my heart and the tears came pouring down, I could expect Max to show up wherever I was within minutes. It never failed. And it wasn’t just for me. He did the same for each of us. After awhile, Max wasn’t the only cat around the house, with additions of Zoë, Switch, and eventually Cooper. Max, being the old guy, never gave up his place as the first and the head. He was like the father of the bunch who seemed quite stoic and distant but had an occasional soft side for his younger feline family members.

When I went off to college, every visit home felt like a last goodbye. He was just getting old, you know? By the time I left, he was sixteen and even that was old for cat years. As I’d head out the door for mom to take me to the airport or to hop in my car for the long drive back to Nashville, I would always pull Max aside and sort of hug him in case that would be my last chance. And still he persisted, and even in his blindness, seemed to always know when I was back home

Well, I am twenty-three today and am having to say goodbye from a distance to my twenty-one year old friend. At 2:15pm today Max is being put down, because old age has gotten the best of him.

But I don’t like to say that, because truly, we got the best of him. All those years of hanging cheese above his head to get him to stand on his hind legs and dance, of emptying tuna cans and leaving them on floor for him to enjoy, of seeing the slow indentation of the pillow on the couch where “his” spot was, and of learning to love and be loved by a cat.



I am thankful for gift God gave us in Max – a constant companion and a stable source of joy, laughter, cuddling (and even frustration) in times of continual change and upheaval.

Max, you will be missed.