Sparkle

Back when Jack died the kids asked if we could get a new kitty. Colin and I decided it would be best to wait until our summer trips were over. When we got back from Waxhaw I went to check the mail and noticed a cat meowing. It sounded distressed but I couldn't get to it because it seemed like it was under the neighbor's house. I asked the guys there to let me know if they found it and if it needed a home. A few minutes later the doorbell rang and there was one of our neighbors holding a tiny kitten! I went to the store that night to get some kitty formula and took her to the vet the next day to get looked over. The vet gave her a clean bill of health besides fleas. We named her Sparkle, because we found her right after our July 4th weekend. And for the next week she won our hearts with all the sweet and tiny kitten cuteness you can imagine.

But on Friday she took a turn for the worst. It was sudden. She was laying funny, as if so exhausted she couldn't even curl up nice and comfy. I picked her up; she was lethargic and felt a little cold. I rushed her to the vet where they put her on oxygen and a warmer. Colin pulled Will out of camp early and we gathered together as a family at the vet's not knowing how things would end. Hours later Sparkle's health was up and down. The vet offered to personally take her home for the weekend and care for her in hopes to nurse her back to health. It was incredibly difficult to be separated from her, she had become our new baby (yes, Lucy was dethroned). Saturday we heard that she seemed to be ok but needed to make it through the weekend to have a better since of if she would make it. That night we took the kids to see a movie with the neighbor's kids, followed by ice cream. It was during all this fun that we got the call. Sparkle had died. She had been laying on the vet's husband's chest and then suddenly cried out (the death meow) then passed away.

Sparkle was so very special to us. It was incredibly hard to lose her. So. much. crying. And once again, I found myself preparing for a cat funeral. This was not supposed to happen. We just lost Jack. She was so little. We rescued her. But in the end it was likely because of "a failure to thrive" that she was abandoned in the first place. So if she was going to die, better for her to have had the love and snuggles for her last week.