Cleocatra Powell

It's been well over a month now, and I'm just ready to talk about this. I wanted to let you all know that we lost our baby, Cleocatra on October 7. She had developed asthma about two years ago. Roman and I worked very closely with our vet to make sure she had whatever medications we could find for her. I even learned how to give shots. Sadly, she had a very severe asthma attack on the morning of the 7th. It's been an extremely hard time for both Roman and me.

Cleo adoped us in 1995, right after my kitty, Burt passed away at 19. She had so many unique traits. When she was a kitten, she didn't stop meowing as she ate! It sounded like, "rowl-rowl-reowl" as she chewed. She bonded with me in her early years when I didn't have a job. She followed me wherever I went through our apartment, and then through our house.

In 1998, Roman and I both had jobs out of the house and felt bad about leaving Cleo alone, so Allie adoped us! It took Cleo a while to get used to her aunt (we have biological proof that Cleo is, indeed, Allie's niece), but they soon became almost inseparable. Cleo taught Allie the ropes of drinking out of the faucet and setting up residence in empty boxes. Cleo acted like she didn't want another cat around, but when we thought we weren't around, we'd see her giving Allie a bath. They grew to love each other, and we'd often find them cuddled together when we'd come home from work.

Cleo was a very neat cat. Odd she would have picked me in that regard. Every time after we fed her, and she finished eating, she would scrape around the plate to make sure no scraps were left. She did the every time she ate. When we'd leave her with the vet when we were on vacation, they always commented about how she'd clean up her food area!

In 1998, Roman and I moved into our house. We had a lot of friends and family helping us move everything, and my cousin Ben took care of Cleo and Allie. Of course, he was a teenager and didn't want to move heavy things, so he and the girls camped out in the upstairs bathroom - effectively allowing them to slowly adapt without encountering the chaos of the move.

A few years later, Roman and I found ourselves awakening to strange noises in the middle of the night. It sounded like a cat in a lot of pain. A little background - our laundry area is in our basement. Because Cleo was an indoor kitty, she especially liked the (literally) full basement with all its places to hide. To our delight, the late-night noises turned out to be Cleo. What we discovered is that she would "kill" our dirty socks in the laundry pile and then bring them all the way upstairs to us as gifts! Those of you unfamiliar with cat behavior - outdoor cats typically kill rodents, rabbits (as in Burt on Easter), etc and bring them to you as "gifts." It's totally out of love. There were mornings where we'd wake up and find 10 socks around the bed, on the stairs, in the kitchen - she loved us a lot!

We were content with our two kitties until 2003, when Indy found us. It was July 4th, he was a scrawny kitten in our flowerbed, and since it was a holiday, no Vet's offices were open. We had to keep him overnight, and he kinda grew on us! Cleo was more accepting, and Allie was the more apprehensive of the girls. But oh, how he loved his girlfriends. He especially liked Cleo. Ever since Indy joined our family, he's been all kitten. He wanted to play with Cleo all the time, and by "play," I mean tackle. She hated it. We felt awful about the screeches, and we did everything we could to let them both know they were loved, despite the age and temperament difference.

Time heals all wounds, I hear. Allie and Indy had a definite adjustment period. For weeks, they would look for her, sniffing around the area where she had her last asthma attack. I couldn't even change the bedsheets for the longest time - I knew it held Cleo's smell and would comfort them to some degree. It's taken Roman and me this long to not cry every single day. The love and support we received from friends and family (and even friends' family) was so overwhelming. To know we have so many people in our lives who understand how tragic a loss this was for us made us feel blessed. We don't have kids, and we really do love our cats as part of our family. They each have unique personalities, just as we humans do. The people who supported us through this are truly special to us. We thank each and every one of you.

We will miss Cleo so much. Roman and I discussed so many memorial options, and eventually decided upon cremation. It was me that couldn't part with her. I wanted an urn with a photo, and Roman picked out the exact one. She's with us now, on a shelf upstairs. I still haven't picked out the perfect photo, but I did give her my red Nike running socks. Apparently they were her favorites, because they have the most teeth holes!

We thank all of you for your kind thoughts and understanding. She was our first baby, and we will miss her so much.