Life on the Vine

The one constant presence in our lives and home for these entire 15 years of marriage has been Smokey.  Smokey is our blue-eyed, grey Siamese cat who we rescued during a pet adopt-a-thon in Queeny Park in Saint Louis the summer before we got married.  After four years of living with diabetes and the onset of violent seizures, Tom and I realized late last week that it was time to say good-bye to Smokey. After fifteen years there are sounds that become so ingrained in your daily life that you only notice them once they are gone.  The padding of paws and claws across tile floors or going up and down the stairs.  The sound of back legs crouching and then leaping off the ground into a chair or a cat tree and the thump of jumping down.  Paws banging on the side of a litter box and the meow/mauw that greets you multiple times a day.  Usually an indicator that someone is ready for food.  Siamese are typically very vocal, talkative cats, and Smokey was no exc...

It was July/August 2000 and I had graduated from college that May and moved from Utah to Nebraska.  I was getting ready to move into my first apartment, living on my own for the very first time.  My parents who lived down the road from where I'd be living were encouraging me to get a pet, namely a cat.  They thought it would be nice for me to have something to come home to in the evenings, instead of coming home to an empty apartment.  We had family pets as I was growing up but none of them were my sole responsibility.  I vacillated over whether I was ready for the responsibility of having a pet of my very own.  It seemed like a serious commitment.  Here would be an animal that could conceivably live for 10+ years and I would be responsible for the caring, feeding and expense of them for the duration.  I don't think I had a permanent job yet as I was working as a temp.  So no set income yet.  I didn't know where I would be in the next ...