Smokey Biorseth, R.I.P.
Cole Biorseth, welcome home.

Vic Biorseth, Wednesday, July 29, 2009
http://www.Thinking-Catholic-Strategic-Center.com

Smokey Biorseth had been slowly failing for some time. We had to give him his special medicine that we would wipe inside his ear once a day to maintain his thyroid balance. He wouldn't take pills, so we had to grind up his other pills, make a sort of slurry with water and inject it way back into his mouth with a sort of hypodermic device minus the needle. He hated it, and we hated doing it. An elderly cat, he had gone down to virtually skin and bones. We coaxed him into eating, experimenting with all sorts of kitty food to find something he would eat more of, and perhaps gain back some weight.

The second to last time we took him to the vet they kept him for three days, getting him properly hydrated and fed intravenously. Going to the vet seemed to be the only way to get him rejuvenated for awhile, probably due to getting the proper vitamins and minerals necessary for good kitty health. Each time, he would come home in better health and mood, and he would eat and drink, and he would curl up on or near Marcie, and be “normal,” in so much as an elderly cat can be normal.

But, just as before, after a couple of days, the downhill slide was rapid. He slowed and stopped eating; he seemed to want to eat, but when his food was presented he just pushed it around a little and laid down. Then he seemed to be having difficulty walking. He would go a short way and lay down. He would come into the kitchen asking for food, in a manner quite familiar and fully understood by all of us. We generally fed him in one of the downstairs bathrooms because his food was different than Honkey’s food and we had to keep their food separate and keep them apart for feeding. However, after asking for food, he had trouble getting up to go and eat it. When I carried him, he seemed to be in pain.

Well, to make a long story short, this time the vet kept him again, and the next day the call was not good. Our Smokey was in the final stages of kidney failure. They could “boost” him up and give him energy again, but it would only be for a shorter time, and each time would be shorter, and he would eventually die from it. Marcie was the one they called; and she had to tell them to put our poor Smokey down. It was heart breaking. She just cried and cried. Of course, I handled it OK. Real men don’t cry. Sometimes we get something in our eye, or something gets caught in our throat, but we never cry. No, really.

Our first cat, Pooter Biorseth, was buried out in back right in front of the lilies. Marcie asked me to bury our Smokey beside the lilies, right against the back fence. Of course, again, we talked about the possibility of cats going to Heaven, and again, it was comforting to know how God loves His creatures. Now, I know, I know, there is no doctrine regarding animal souls. There’s nothing in the Old Testament about it; our Lord never spoke of it; His Apostles never spoke of it; there’s nothing about it that I know of in the sacred Deposit of Faith. Yet, we are comforted by how, at each step of Creation, He saw that “it was good.” If the Church, guided by Peter, never said there is a kitty Heaven, well, neither did it say there is not, or that any sort of afterlife is prohibited to beings lower than humans and angels.

So, at the selected site against the back fence alongside the lilies, I said a little prayer for the repose of the soul of our beloved pet, as stupid as that may seem to some, and then began digging Smokey’s grave.

Movement in the lilies caught my attention, and a small, black, yellow-eyed face poked out. Out stepped a youngish, months-old, coal-black kitten, the spitting image of how Smokey must have looked at that age. He sniffed Smokey; he sniffed the new partially dug grave; and he more cautiously sniffed my hand. He allowed me to pick him up, and I took him into the house to show Marcie. More tears, this time while hugging a new kitty who didn’t know what was going on. Of course, Marcie was the one who cried; real men don’t ever cry, remember?

The Church has no doctrine on any such thing as Kitty Heaven, or animals in Heaven, and never will. Nothing may be added to, subtracted from, or changed within the Deposit of Faith. Be all that as it may, the fact that this new kitty emerged from the lilies, and the fact that the lily is the flower of the Resurrection, was not lost on us. And, of course, we do not believe in reincarnation. However, this whole thing was, to us, too much of a coincidence to really be a coincidence, although others may disagree. God works in mysterious ways, and we are not given to understand it all.

Yet, I do believe that He, in His wisdom, sent this little one to us to ease our pain of loss, and to help dry my Marcie’s tears. (Of course, real men don’t cry.) So now, Honkey Biorseth has a new buddy to play with. I wanted to name the new recruit “Smokey II”, but Marcie wanted Coal, but spelled as Cole, and she won, as usual. Cole Biorseth it is.

Farewell, old buddy.

Welcome to our home, Cole.

Reference Material

Return to Web Site Log (Blog) page

Return to HOME PAGE

Build/Host/Maintain Your Own Personal Website using SBI! (Advertisement)

Please note the language and tone already established in this Website. This is not the place to stack up vulgar one-liners and crude rejoinders. While you may support, oppose or introduce any position or argument, your comments must meet our standards of logical rigor and of civil discourse. We will not participate in trading insults, and we will not tolerate participants trading insults with each other. Participants should not be thin-skinned or over sensitive to criticism, but should be prepared to defend their arguments when challenged. If you don’t really have a coherent argument or counter-argument of your own, sit down and don’t embarrass yourself. If you have something serious to contribute to the conversation, please keep it civil. We apologize to religious conservative thinkers for the need to even say these things.