Brian: Don’t read this one, you’ll be sad. Really.
After a long blog hiatus, I’m going to try and catch back up to the present this weekend, I think (no promises, yo).
What blog-paralyzed me was the death of our beloved companion animal, Harvard. Without going into much detail, I will say that my step-cat Harvey (aka Harvard/Harvs/Harmar/Harmartini/Shadow Cat/Grey Cat) died suddenly on Saturday, August 30th (Nathan and Heidi’s wedding day). I wrote/compiled most of what is below a couple weeks later, but I couldn’t quite get through it and publish it, but here it is:
Brian adopted Harvey when Harvey was a kitten in 2004, and I first met Harvard (and Brian) late in 2007 when they lived in the Old Apartment. Here’s Harvard with my shoes in the Old Apartment:
Since Harvard died, we’ve really been struggling. Before you take offense, I *KNOW* that everyone loves their companion animals. I would NEVER challenge another companion animal person to a love-off, at all, I PROMISE. But, consider this acknowledgement of how important our animal pals are, which I found on the internet a month or two ago and liked:
Brian and I are both introvert nerds who like our companion animals more than we like most people. We are homebodies who spend a lot of time with our cats. Not to mention that Brian works from home, so the cats are part of nearly 100% of his day. Faithful readers will remember that Harvey had been diagnosed with renal problems (though his death did not seem to be obviously related to that), so he had special low-protein canned food that Brian/we gave to Harvey several times a day and *2* water fountains to encourage frequent drinking. That’s a lot of daily routine based around the Grey Cat. Harvard was a cat who was basically a dog, and he was a lapdog at that. I know it’s been really difficult for Brian, as Harvard’s person…if I could feel worse so that Brian could feel better right now, I would do it in a heartbeat.
Brian and I have been through our pictures and videos, and sometimes I laugh about things Harvey did, and sometimes I sob like a baby. I have selected a few Harvard pictures for this post that struck me on looking through them for the 230,239th time lately.
Harvey’s face – representative of the standoffish skittish deer that he was. Also see: badass nose scar:
Harvey under Brian’s bathroom sink chillin’:
Harvey on his person’s desk, helping during the work day:
These are the pictures that make me sob. When I talked to my Dad about what happened, he very clearly stayed away from us because he knew we’d be a mess (messes?), but he said, “Please tell Brian that I’m sorry about his pardner,” which is definitely what Harvey was:
This is not the best picture of Harvard, at all, but it’s one of my favorites…a selfie, of sorts, of Harvard in a cat garage (a Beach Family tradition):
As faithful readers know, I’ve gotten increasingly into gardening over the last several years. All along, I could always count on the Grey Cat to be in the window while I was planting or watering or deadheading…This is my other favorite picture – again, not that good – but it shows some of Harvard’s and my special times:
Writing and re-reading this made me cry…maybe not the most appropriate blog post ever. All 3 of the faithful readers of this blog know that I’ve tried to acknowledge all of the big things that have happened in my life in this narrative blog…and this was a big thing.