PSI Annual Journal 2001

Cats have always been an important part of my life. I have experienced the gift of unconditional sharing with the ones who have found their way into my life. My relationships with them have been fulfilling and precious. I wrote this story after several of my very beloved cat companions parted from the earth. Each of my cat friends that departed, left at fourteen years of age. One of them, my sweet Spazzy, was a real spiritual companion. Let me share with you some of the experiences that I had with her and my other little cat friends.

My close, intimate friend of fourteen years was the most recent to leave. I say that she was an intimate friend because she was willing to share with me, no matter what my frame of mind was. She passed from this world on into the next after a struggle with cancer. Actually, I had to decide for her when she would depart. With great difficulty, I make the decision to put her to sleep. It was one of the hardest decisions that I ever had to make. I was tormented by it for months. Some people would say, "Oh! But how could that be so upsetting, she was only a cat." Well, it's true. She did have the body of a cat, but all who live on this earth are precious beings. She was a special little being who enthusiastically shared with me and I with her. We took care of one another on a nurturing level every day. We also entertained one another and had respect and compassion for one another. Her name was Spazzy.

It was my next-door neighbors who named her. She belonged to them for almost two years. Well, actually, for almost a year of that time she lived on the street. There seemed to be a lot of strays in that neighborhood. It was a bit transient. Lot of lower income families would come and go from the single-family houses. I would always hear about who was getting evicted because they didn't pay their rent. They would go and the cats would stay. My children and I would see Spazzy wandering the streets looking a bit rough with battle scars showing on her face and ears. Bonny and Pamela would beg me to let her come live with us, but we already had two cats, previously strayed cats, and little space in that tiny house. We really didn't have a whole lot of money either. I had a soft heart though and I always seemed to find a little more work to make a little bit more money when we needed it. The strays would come and we would feed them, but only a few got to stay and live with us.

Tom was the first cat that we took in. He was a big tom cat who had been strayed for years and was wild. Initially, he would never get close enough to anyone to be touched, but if food was left out, he would come and eat it. That is, he would eat it only once the door was closed and then he'd leave. He knew how to get food. We knew this because he was quite large and if it wasn't for the torn ears and white patches of fur turned gray one would never know that he was a street cat. Lots of people in the neighborhood would feed the strays, especially in the winter. If this was not the case, a lot of them would have died. There was one winter though that was really severe and some of the strays began to disappear. It was during one big blizzard that I heard the big Tom crying a God awful cry from the middle of the road. I opened the door and saw him standing there all covered with snow as he looked at me. He stood as though frozen in place under the light of the street lamp. I felt his desperation and pain. My children watched him out the window and begged me to help him. I knew that I had to. I knew at that moment that I would befriend him and give him a home.

The front door was wide open with snow and wind blowing into the living room as I crouched in the doorway. Snow began to cover my arm as I held it outstretched offering Tom some food along with some soft-spoken words of compassion. As the minutes passed, he began to edge his way closer to the house. I could see that a great conflict was going on inside of him because he was afraid. His anguish filled cries got louder as he got closer. He was afraid, but he was also desperate. I told my daughters that I would stay there for as long as it took to gain his trust. It was almost an hour later when he entered through the door. I had strong faith that he would trust and he could sense my sincere intentions, so he did let go of just enough fear to come in for a while, to eat some food and get warm, but then he went out into the blizzard again. While he was in, I never did shut the door and we never attempted to touch him. We just continued to talk softly to him while keeping our movements very slow.

The next day, the sun was out and Tom was back. We continued the same ritual for weeks, however, each time it became slightly changed. He came into the house more quickly and stayed a little longer. By the end of two weeks, we could close the door and he would let us pat him briefly. He was guarded for months, but he finally realized that he had a home with us. He became more and more affectionate to the point where my daughters could dress him up in doll clothes and pretend that he was their baby. He was their friend and companion when I worked long hours. My daughter Bonny had a special closeness with him and he to all of us. He proved his devotion to her one night, when if it were not for him, we could have had a tragedy take place.

He woke us all up out of sleep as his yowls filled the house. Despite the fact that he was physically challenged with a broken pelvis and couldn't walk, when he smelled smoke coming from Bonny's bedroom, he managed to drag himself in there and wake her up. When his cries woke her, she opened her eyes to see flames that were a foot high, dancing on top of her electric blanket. Her survival instincts quickly moved her into action. She rolled up the blanket and snuffed out the flames. By then, Tom had made his way into my room while yowling. As I awoke, he fell backwards on the floor after he had made an attempt to jump onto the bed. We were all up out of bed and a near tragedy was resolved. We stood in awe of a truly amazing little being who never let us forget how grateful he was for the care and love that we gave him. We likewise, never let him forget how grateful we were. After that, he was called King Tom and was showered with even more love and kindness. He brought a richness to our lives, but no matter how much that meant to us, no matter how much we loved him, no matter how much help I got for him we were unable to save him from what was a very tragic departure.

The very neighbors who abandoned Spazzy had a German Shepherd who attacked Tom and caused injuries that eventually over six months time brought him to his death. We were all very grieved when he died. On the very night of his departure, Bonny had a visit from him in a dream. He came to her as an angel. In the dream she knew that he had come to say good-bye to her and comfort her grief. To this day she still speaks of it and gets tears in her eyes. She's in her twenties now. Tom had only lived with us for three years before he died, but he has never been forgotten. We had another cat come to us during that same time period, but stayed with us much longer.

Her name was Athena. She had been abused and abandoned three towns away and ended up in a cat shelter. At that time, I worked for the woman who owned the shelter where Athena was being temporarily housed. I would go there to clean the cats cages and to feed them. Athena was nameless and had small kittens when I first saw her. She had such a sweetness about her, but nobody adopted her. Months went by and the last of her kittens was as big as she was. They would sit together and she would still wash that big cat as though it were still a kitten. It was so sweet. I would always stop and talk to her and she would always lick my hand. One day, I just decided to bring her home.

She was the scaredy cat of the house for years, but no wonder - she had been through many difficulties. It took her a long time to trust people, especially men. For years, she would scurry under a piece of furniture when people would come into the house, but eventually she became very comfortable and people would comment that she appeared to be holy or spiritual. Eventually, in her eyes there was the look of total peace. It appeared that perhaps she had a deep understanding of life. With Tom gone, Athena was alone, but not for long. Another cat was given to us almost immediately. I didn't want another cat, but because of the particular situation, I didn't know how to say no either.

When Tom died, I was so grieved that the woman who owned the cat shelter felt bad and wanted to help. When I went to her house one day, she led me into the shelter. She told me that she had a surprise for me and handed me a little fur ball. Yes, that would be Cocoa. That was the name that I gave her. She was nothing but a little ball of chocolate fur. Her fur was long with tuffs of it coming from her cheeks and ears. She had been abandoned in a little box along with her siblings at a local grocery store. They had been in that box long enough for hundreds of fleas to breed. The kittens all ended up in a weakened state from flea anemia and were lucky to be alive. Cocoa had been bathed to get rid of the fleas, but since she was so weak and needed a chemical free bath, a hundred or so of them still remained roaming around on her skin beneath that tiny dense thicket of fur that she was. I brought her home and we all took turns spending days picking the fleas from her. As her strength was regained, she became a very active little kitten. She was quite playful, but was often bored with Athena. She developed a pattern of sneaking up on Athena and startling her. Athena spent her time hissing at Cocoa to defend and reclaim her territory on a daily basis. Then when Spazzy came along, she had no patience for Cocoa's pouncing. She'd just give her a little swat or turn the tables and chase her around the house. Spazzy's permanent residence in the house came about in a similar way to Tom's situation.

Winter had moved in once again as usual and there were a number of strays living in the neighborhood. Spazzy was one stray who came to our house almost daily to be fed. I was very resistant to letting another cat come into the house to share our little space, but then it got cold and my heart could not bare to see her outside with pleading eyes. She was very tough looking for a female. Her body was large and muscular, face serious, personality powerful, sure, abrupt, domineering and then she became very devoted to me. At first, I didn't much care for her hardened ways, but I never got angry at her when she tried to claw me. Sometimes when I made a movement that was too fast she'd get scared or she'd growl when I picked her up. In those situations, I only spoke to her with softness and kindness - letting her know how wonderful she was. Little by little, her hardness began to soften. She developed a real trust and closeness with me. I'd come home from anywhere and she'd be just inside the door ready to greet me. If I let her outside during the evening, I would without fail, hear her tapping the latch of the door when it was my bedtime. Once inside, she'd follow me from kitchen to bathroom to bedroom as I carried out my nightly routine. When I got into bed, then she'd get into bed too. I'd lay on my side and read while she layed on my hip to get patted. As soon as the lights went out she'd go to the foot of the bed and sleep there until morning.

None of the other cats slept on my bed unless it was really cold outside and then they'd spread themselves out all around where I lay. They were all special in their own way. Athena was more attached to Pamela than anyone else and Cocoa could never seem to get enough attention from cat or human. She remained kitten like throughout most of her adult life in behavior, mannerisms and body size. She'd often be waiting around doorways for the other cats to enter or in behind the litter box. Her antics would send the other cats hissing and flying through the air. I suppose she figured that this was the only way that she held any position of power since her body size was never taken seriously otherwise.

Unless Cocoa was terrorizing one of the other cats, they all got along quite well while sharing the same space. However, if they were out in the yard, they had a tendency to become territorial and keep stray cats out. They only allowed beat up, weakened cats to come onto the property. I do believe that they allowed it because they knew that I wanted to help those cats. All three of my cats mostly stayed in the yard. This was especially true for Spazzy except for one time when she involuntarily left the yard. Actually, she left the neighborhood.

There was one night when I never heard her tap the latch on the door to come in at bedtime. I thought it strange. I was worried. All of the neighbors probably heard me calling out in the darkness to her for a long time. I slept in my bed alone that night. There was no cat friend at the foot of the bed that night or any night for an entire week. Bonny, Pamela and I called to her while going up and down streets - on foot and in the car. We called the animal control to report her missing. We posted flyers on telephone poles with her picture. We asked children and adults if they saw her and then, Bonny asked a woman who was outside in her yard at the end of the street. She described what Spazzy looked like. When the woman heard the description, she spoke of a strange sight that she had seen. It was about four days earlier that she noticed a Ford Bronco ride by with a cat just like that on the roof.

A friend of mine had been visiting with us who owned that type of vehicle just four days earlier. Spazzy must have climbed on the roof and he drove away without ever even noticing her. I thought about where he would have first needed to stop after leaving the house and remembered that there was a stop sign posted about two miles away. Some possibilities were unfolding. I was propelled by a renewed sense of hope as I drove to the end of that road where the stop sign was. It was near a big school bus parking lot. As I approached, I noticed that one of the drivers was still in there. From the other side of the fence, I called to him, "Excuse me. Could I talk to you for a minute." He was quite friendly. He had a big smile on his face, as he approached from the other side of the lot. I asked him if he had seen a black, white, orange and brown tiger cat in the area perhaps four days prior to my asking. He looked quite pleased to know that he could offer me something that might soften my concerned face. He explained that he had seen a cat who looked just like the one I described. She had been wandering around the bus yard three days previous. She looked lost and dazed.

Yes, I knew then that she had to be alive somewhere. I began to send her thoughts and feelings throughout each day after that with the hope that she would be able to connect to them and find her way home. Whenever anyone thinks a thought or feels a feeling about anyone, an energy connection is made. Animals are very much in tune to it and I believed that my constant thoughts about the correct route home would guide Spazzy back to the house. On the seventh night I was filled with excitement and overwhelming gratitude when I heard a tap on the door latch. As I opened the door, Spazzy's little face was looking up at me and her body was wobbling. She could barely stand. She was so frail and weak. I scooped her up into the safety of my arms and held her for hours without putting her down for a minute. She was comforted as I patted her and spoke to her with caring words. She was even fed while being held. Also, I carefully, checked her for injuries.

She seemed to have none until I spotted her paws. I was shocked to see that every one of her claws had been broken off on the front paws and on the back feet it was worse. The little pads were worn down beyond raw and the claws were worn down to nothing. I could only imagine what happened to cause her condition. She must have slid off of the roof of the car, down the back where she caught the bumper with her front claws and then was dragged for some distance. With her hind feet being dragged on the pavement and her front claws eventually breaking off she must have then been dropped free to the ground in a state of trauma. The dog officer also suggested that this must have been the scenario. When I checked the Bronco, there were claw marks going all the way down the back of it. I could only imagine what the experience was like for Spazzy. My daughters and I fussed over her for weeks after that. She did recover from her ordeal and enjoyed spending a lot of time in the house. When she did go outside, I never did see her go on the roof of a car again for years and she stayed in the yard.

We eventually moved to a new house where we all enjoyed spending more time outside. As a group, we all went on little adventures. At the new house, we did have fewer rooms, but more yard and some woods. The cats loved it. That was one of my stipulations for moving. That is, I wanted it to be right for them. A nice yard and open space was important for them so that they could be happy. Soon after we moved in, we all started taking walks together in the field behind the house - then beyond into the woods.

I would just make mention of it and all three cats would follow after me in single file out the door and around the back of the house. I think that, after a short time, they viewed me as the lead cat. I would walk very slowly and mindfully - in a trance state while perceiving everything through the senses. While in that state, I would feel all of our energies synchronize. Often in the woods, the birds would spot us and begin squawking and swooping down at us. Because our energies were synchronized, they would treat me as though I were a big cat and was a threat to them. Whenever I went into the woods alone, I never had that same experience. They never made noises at me or swooped down at me when I was alone. I found that the cats liked to take their time when out exploring. They would often stop in their tracks and meow at me to let me know that they just wanted to stop for a few minutes or so to take in the sights or to feel the ground under them or to explore some under brush. We all did the same things together. We either all walked and explored everything through our senses or we sat or laid down and relaxed. Occasionally, in the beginning, they would go under bushes and stand waiting and meowing for me to come along not realizing that I could not fit. They soon figured it out and let me lead the way in more open areas. An outside adventure seemed to satisfy them if it was an hour and a half to two hours long. If it was less, they would resist going home. As Athena got old, sick and frail. I remember those last walks and especially one of her very last.

She was very thin and weak. Her vision was poor. She had a hard time hearing. She still loved the walks though, but sometimes she would fall behind. We'd have to stop and wait for her. This was understood and respectfully done. We stopped a lot more during the last year of her life. There was one walk toward the end though where she was a bit wobbly. She was very slow. At one point, we got a bit too far ahead of her a couple of times - maybe twenty feet. She couldn't see us or hear us. She cried at the top of her lungs believing that she was lost. We all immediately stopped and I tried to carry her, but she wouldn't let me. She just wanted to walk like the other cats and she did walk the entire way. After the second time that she became afraid, we all became more patient - walking more slowly and resting more often. Cocoa stayed closer to her in an attentive way. I know the other cats understood that it was one of her last walks. During her very last walk, she went alone with just me. She walked some and I carried her some. That day, she knew that it was the only way. She was a wise cat. Athena had an inner strength in those last years of her life. She had overcome most all of her fears. At one point she discovered that she didn't have to be afraid of the dog who lived in the house out front anymore.

Lucy had a habit of chasing after her every time she left the door of her house. Athena would run and Lucy would go a mile a minute after her. She was a golden retriever. Her tail would flip back and forth wildly and her mouth would be stretched back in a smile. Then, one day, everything changed. When she began her usual routine of running across the yard toward Athena, she just stood there. She put her back up in the air and hissed. Well, the dog was shocked. Lucy stopped in her tracks about six feet from Athena, laid on the ground on her back and whined as though she were pleading with her to play the game the right way. Well, Athena had discovered that it could be a game and there was no way that she was going to give up her new found part. She began to joyfully play with the dog after that first experience. Her face was different then. It would light up with excitement and she would stand proud every time she saw the dog coming toward her and the same routine would take place over and over again. I myself learned a lot from Athena. We seemed to overcome our fears at a similar pace. Perhaps we influenced one another in ways that could not be perceived in obvious ways. In the end, it was very difficult for me to see Athena leave. It was also difficult for the other cats - especially for Cocoa.

Athena became very weakened toward the end. One day when I was having lunch, she had a heart attack right next to me. She let out the most God-awful screech and then fell weak. I knew that it wasn't good. She had very little strength left in her body. I thought it best to let her go naturally without drugs in her system. On a spiritual level, it is believed that drugs interfere with the souls ability to properly move on. It was like torture for me to watch her die. I would sit over her and weep uncontrollably while holding her, patting her, talking to her and rocking her. At one point, I had to go out for a short time, so I left her as comfortable as possible on a rug. When I returned, she saw me enter the room and reached her little paw up toward me. It was a heart wrenching sight. I knew that I could not leave her side again. I comforted her in my arms for hours and then as it got late into the night, I wrapped her in a little blanket and put her in bed with me. At one point, I drifted off to sleep with her little paw in the palm of my hand. I was awakened at two in the morning as her claws gently pressed on my palm. As I looked at her, she was looking at me and her breath was labored. I put my hands on her and talked to her. Within five minutes, she took one last big breath - then she was gone. I felt her leave her body. There was an energetic sensation that moved up and out. I was numb. Spazzy was right there. She became afraid as she sensed Athena leave her body, she looked up at the ceiling and growled. I'm sure she was confused. Athena loved to lay on anything that had my scent on it, so I took off my nightgown and wrapped her in it with only her little face showing. She looked like a mummy. I couldn't bring myself to bury her right away, so I placed her on the rug in my bedroom until the end of that day. It was comforting to go and look at her occasionally.

During one of those times, Cocoa also came in and looked at her. I saw her little ears go back and she ran out of the room. I never thought about preventing her from seeing Athena in that state, but maybe I should have. She became severely depressed after that for three months. She stopped playing with her toys. She barely moved. Her eyes drooped. I was desperate to help her to feel better. I'd talk to her and pat her and I tried to get her to play with her toys, but nothing worked. Then, I gave her a homeopathic remedy every day for three weeks. It was called Ignatia. I was in the kitchen one afternoon when suddenly, from the living room, I heard the sound of a toy rolling around on the floor. She was lively again and she was playing. I was so excited that I went out to the store and bought her two more toys.

She did become happier, but it was rare that she would go for walks anymore. Sometimes she would start out, go a short ways and then turn around on her own to go home. It was mostly just Spazzy and I that went for walks after that. Spazzy was so close to me that perhaps Cocoa felt alone without Athena there. When it was just Spazzy and I, we would go further into the woods, but when it was far enough, she would stop, start meowing at me and refuse to go any further. She often wanted to stop for reasons other than being tired. Sometimes I was aware of the reason and at other times, I was not. A couple of times, soon after she had stopped, I heard a voice or a dog barking just a short ways off. She did not like running into any other people or animals. If it happened, she would hide until they were gone. We only enjoyed those walks for two more years until she too left her body and moved on.

She had cancerous tumors and struggled for the last year of her life. She did remain very bold, confident, mostly happy and determined. Nine months before her death, she got very weak and sick. I thought that I might loose her then, but I borrowed a magnet mattress from a friend and started her on an herbal formula for cancer. Within a week's time, her strength came back. She was almost normal, but I continued to give her the herbs for months. I made a paste out of them. I would roll the mixture up in a little ball and give it to her twice a day. The tumors were shrinking, but she absolutely hated taking the herbs. She became stressed about it. She would fight me and began to run every time that she saw me. If I looked at her or spoke to her, she'd start moving her mouth as though she was tasting something. She became obsessed. She started to become unhappy, so I stopped giving them to her. Within weeks, the tumors were breaking out into sores on her body, but she seemed happy again. She went outside and explored, went for walks, purred and ate, but she looked absolutely terrible. Things seemed pretty good until she clawed one of the tumors on her head and made it raw. It was bad and I tried everything to make her stop. I bandaged her foot so she couldn't use her claws. She pulled it off. I wrapped her head up. She got that off. I put a cone collar around her neck. She got depressed and kept her face in a corner. I made her a lightweight cone collar out of clear plastic and she was better with that, but she wanted to go outside. I wouldn't let her out though. I was afraid that she wouldn't be able to defend herself properly if I let her out, but then she proved me wrong.

She loved to go out in the rain. One night there was a big thunder storm and she woke me up in the middle of the night crying, but I ignored her and went back to sleep. I had told her, "No Spazzy. You can't go out. You'll get hurt." Well, I got up in the morning and couldn't find her anywhere. I looked in every room, under furniture, in every corner - she was nowhere. Then, I noticed that one living room window had been pushed open. It was one of those windows that opened outward from the bottom. I looked close and saw some of her fur on the edge of the window. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It was a second floor window with a long drop to the ground. I thought that the worst could have possibly happened. She could be severely injured or dead on the ground out there. I went outside looking for her. Where could she be. I called and called. "Spazzy. Come on Spazzy. Where's my kitty". I looked under every bush - I called for ten minutes and then I heard her meow. The sound wasn't coming from the ground though. It was coming from somewhere else. I called. She meowed again. Yes, I could see her. She was on the roof. My Goodness! She had jumped to he ground from the second floor. Then she climbed up on the chicken coop, up a tree and then onto the roof of the house where she could be outdoors and in a place where she knew she'd be safe. She was not fragile by any means. She was strong and she was smart. I decided then, that she proved herself capable. She could go outside.

Since she hated the herbs so much, I made home-made food every day with blue/green algae in it and she seemed to stay strong and the tumors were stable, but then she disappeared. I couldn't find her anywhere. It was after three days that I found her in the chicken coop. Her head was severely infected and she was miserable. It took me two hours to clean her up. At that point, I decided that it was time to try a bandage on the head again. I found a strong cloth tape. She couldn't get this one off. I put her back on the herbs, but added two more types to he mixture. This time, she didn't seem to mind taking them and she was quite comfortable with the bandage on her head. She actually enjoyed having the bandage changed every day and she didn't plead with me to go outside. She stayed quiet in the house for eight days. By then, the infection was completely cleared and she became a bit antsy. She had been listening to the birds again and watching them in the tree from the window.

I knew that I had to take her outside. It was time. We took our usual walk. She was in absolute heaven out there that day. It was hot, so she wanted to stop in the shade a lot. I'd watch her holding her face up to the breeze and then her gaze would go into the trees watching the birds and listening. She had found joy again. It was in her face - in her eyes. Over the next month, we had many more walks. Spazzy was happy, but I noticed something else happening. Sometimes she didn't hear me when I called her. She also had a hard time judging distance and her skin got so itchy that she was scratching all the time. I could see that she was beginning to again deteriorate. I began to think about having her put to sleep. I just couldn't bare the thought of seeing her go through a long drawn out period of suffering, but then, I began to question, "Do I have the right to decide when her life experience should end. Would we ever consider putting a human being to sleep in this state? " I was tormented with the choices. I was overwhelmed with the idea of seeing her die and needing to bury her. I finally decided, "OK I'll dig a hole in the ground, so then I won't have to think about that. If she dies, it will be there, if she doesn't, I'll plant a tree. I felt a bit relieved, but I soon found out that it effected her in another way.

She knew what I did and she went into hiding. I couldn't find her for a day and a half. Finally, I had an idea. I would telepathically ask a bird about her where abouts. I was out behind the chicken coop when I spotted a blue jay overhead in a tree. Immediately I created an image of her ( a cat with a bandage on her head) and then sent him the image with a feeling of love and concern. He flew off squawking as I walked to another part of the yard. As I walked in the yard, my attention was caught by five little finches who were fluttering about in a small area of branches on an apple tree. As I approached, they made lots of noise and continued flying around the same few branches. I walked under the tree, looked up into that same area and who do you think was laying there on a big fat limb. It was Spazzy. There was such a sweetness, an innocense in her face. The whole group of birds fluttered around on branches at a distance no less than a foot away from her. As she caught my eye she heard my voice. Her voice spoke in soft, gentle meows as if to say, "Oh, you found me. You see, I'm safe - safe within the protection of the tree limbs and with the birds." As she experienced my relief in finding her, she descended down out of the tree to greet me. She was noticeably weaker, but she still had more joyful experiences to come. They did become less and less though until she got to the point where she was mostly unhappy.

It was then that I knew I had to make a choice. It was a very difficult choice. I called the vet and asked if she could come to the house. I knew that this woman truly loved animals. I felt it in her when I had spoken to her one time previously. She said that she could come in three days. It would be in the morning. Those next three days were like torture - sometimes unbearable. I spent my every free minute with Spazzy. I wanted her to have the experience of love in her when it came time for her to depart, so I thought it best that she depart from a loving environment. She sat on my lap a lot while I patted her and nurtured her. On that last night, I didn't sleep much and neither did she. I was still questioning whether I had the right to decide when she should die. I felt that I had seen lots of signs and reasons that led me to the decision, but I asked God to please give me one more clear sign to confirm that a right choice had been made. I was in the bathroom with Spazzy. It was at that moment of asking that she jumped in the window and knocked the Ti-plant on the floor. As I picked it up, I saw that the plant was broken in two. The "tie" had been broken. Ti-plants re-root easily. I would take the broken piece and put it into a new pot. It had been confirmed! It was time for Spazzy to move on to another place to establish another reality for herself. Her tie with the earth plane was being broken.

Morning came and those first hours were dreadful. I could never let Cocoa know what was about to happen or she'd be traumatized, so I put her outside. I held Spazzy, talked to her, cried over her, put her down, picked her up, prayed. I prayed a lot. I asked for St. Francis to be there, for Mother Mary to be there, for legions of rescue angels and healing angels to be there. I asked that they all assist her so that her soul could move on quickly and easily. I almost called the veterinarian half a dozen times to tell her, "Forget it! Don't come. I'm sorry, I can't go through with it." Each desperate minute did pass by right up to our appointment time, but then the vet didn't come for another half an hour. I began to think. Maybe its not supposed to happen. Maybe she's not coming. I started feeling a bit relieved but then in the next second I saw her drive up the driveway. Spazzy was hiding in the litter box. She knew something was going on. I began to cry again. I couldn't even stop long enough to properly say hello as I opened the door.

The veterinarian just followed me in the house with her assistant who followed close behind her. They were very kind and pleasant. As I went to get Spazzy from the litter box, the whole experience felt unbearable to me. I brushed the litter from her feet and held her to my chest. She held on to my clothing with her claws. She did not want to let go, but the vet was all ready for her and waiting. I tried to comfort her as I put her down on the living room rug. I prayed that the vet would be able to find a vein easily. Within minutes she did. Within seconds, Spazzy fell into a relaxed state. Within minutes, her eyes went dark and she was gone from her body. The doctor told me how sorry she was and I thanked her for coming. I couldn't say anything more. I was so dreadfully saddened. It was all so fast. In the next second, the doctor was gone and I was alone with Spazzy. The room had an emptiness about it. I was disoriented. I sat with Spazzy for a while on the rug, but I knew that I had to let her go. It was time for her to be buried in the hole that I had dug out back weeks before. I was careful that Cocoa did not see her. I was still praying for all those rescue angels and St. Francis to comfort her, to help her to move on. Then, when I was back in the house, praying, looking out the window, a hundred or more birds came out of nowhere and suddenly landed on the grass all over the yard. I knew at that moment that those legions of rescue angels had come to comfort and take care of Spazzy. My heart began to lighten some. Within a minute, the birds were gone as quickly as they had come. Life and death bring about an occasional awareness of just how impermanent all things are.

Every aspect of life begins and ends in its own instant. This means that each aspect of life exists in its own moment and then it's gone and then, there's something else. There's never nothing. There's always something, but never the same thing. Memories and learning stay with us as experiences change. Animals live in the moment more than people do. Once a trusting relationship has been developed with an animal friend, the animal will respond with honesty to whatever the reality is in the moment. They often mirror back whatever is given to them. Because of this, the sharing that takes place with animals can sometimes be more real and fulfilling than it is with people.

People often keep experiences or aspects of experiences active in the mind through attachment or desire long after the experiences have disappeared out of their own instant. This is often done through anticipation of outcome or attachment to end results. Nothing is predictable according to what we have known to be in the past. The experiences within every minute, hour, day, month, year, relationship, holiday, joy, difficulty, adventure have a beginning and an end and shall never repeat themselves again. They transition into something new. Every experience and moment is complete and final within itself, but always continues as part of a transitioning collective reality. There is a great simplicity in this process. This simplicity can often be seen in the relationships that take place between people and animals. Any sharing that we have with another soul on this level is a gift of life. However, the simplicity of reality is often missed because of lingering attachment and desire which gets connected to that which has not taken place yet or to that which is presently taking place so that what is real or what is actually happening in its own moment becomes unclear. With something added or taken away from any moment, it can appear as something else with its simplicity clouded. The transition from one moment to the next is subtle, yet extreme in the way that it is just here and then it is just gone. Life exists in the moment, death exists in the moment, simplicity exists in the moment, what is real exists in the moment. That is all that is. There is only each moment pure, bold, clear, real, precious, abrupt and transitioning. The honesty and simplicity that takes place in the trusting relationships between people and animals can teach a way of participating in life that will enrich the quality of all relationships and life experiences. Our animals are our teachers in many ways. Appreciate your animal friends.

P.S. Cocoa is now 16 years old and is doing quite well. She has a new friend named Abraham.

PSI Symposium Annual Journal 2001