July 28, 2026
I want to tell you something,
so there won’t be any doubt,
you’re so wonderful to think of,
but so hard to be without.
I cannot bring back the old days,
when we were together,
but your place next to me is
empty wherever I go in this house,
with my broken and lonely heart.
My Beloved Siah,
I am writing this letter to tell
you how much I miss you; how life without you feels so void of meaning.
I want you to know why I betrayed
your trust and let you go over the rainbow bridge, out of my reach forever.
In May I felt a lump on your side
while caressing you. Dr. Alexander, your veterinarian, was unable to feel a
lump after thoroughly examining you. I asked her to do your annual exam, which
was due next November, so as not to inconvenience you later.
All tests came back normal, except
for a slightly elevated pancreatic enzyme level.
In late June, I noticed a decrease
in your appetite, an increase in your water intake, and abnormally small feces
in the litter box. I also thought you had a fever. Again, Dr. Alexander could
not find anything. She gave you a slow-release antibiotic for any possible
infection.
Upon my request, she also took an X-ray
of your abdomen to see if there was an obstruction in the colon to explain how
your bowel movements had changed. The X-ray showed dark spots in the lymph
nodes. That worried us. We made an appointment for an ultrasound on the morning
of July 6.
On Monday morning, July 6, I took
you for the ultrasound. Dr. Alexander called at about 12 O’clock with the bad
news that you have late-stage lymphoma that has spread to your vital organs.”
My heart sank.
My beloved Siah,
I had witnessed Lulu, a feral black
male cat whom I brought home from Darby Road, who was diagnosed with lymphoma. A
prescription of prednisone kept him alive for six weeks while he grew thinner.
When he stopped eating altogether, I had to euthanize Lulu at five o’clock in
the morning to spare him more agony, if not any possible pain.
I loved you even more than I did Lulu
because we spent nine years together. I did not want you to suffer as Lulu did.
I agreed with Dr. Alexander to
prepare to euthanize you. I drove as fast as I could to be with you while
sobbing the entire time.
When they brought you to the
examination room, you looked afraid and confused. I held you in my arms and
kissed you to comfort you. There has been nothing more painful in my life than
to euthanize my cat companions to save them from more agony when they were very
sick.
As you were placed on the
examination table with a catheter on your hind leg, I leaned over to shower you
with kisses and tears to say goodbye and to hope that I was comforting you. Dr.
Alexander injected you with a strong dose of a sedative that immediately made
you unconscious. She then delivered the drug that stopped your heart. She then
helped me to regain my composure by giving me a sympathetic hug.
That is how you went over the
rainbow bridge, forever beyond my reach.
Your death was the finality, not
just of you as a person but of our loving relationship. You, especially after
Panther, who died over a year ago, were my companions and main source of joy. I
have always prayed to the universe to divide anything left of my life so the
three of us could live and die together (Here is my Farewell to Panther).
When you died, you turned from a
person into a memory. By losing our loving relationship, I have lost part of my
soul and part of my heart.
My beloved Siah,
Do you remember the first time we
met? It was an evening in the summer of
2017. While I was serving dinner to Latte, Echo, and Max, three feral cats by
the creek near the mailboxes, you appeared seemingly out of nowhere, an
unneutered muscular black male cat with a big head and extra-long fangs who just
walked past us without looking at us or showing any interest in the food I was
serving. You walked straight in the direction of the marijuana farm. I worried
that you were yet another feral cat on the marijuana farm, as were the three
cats I was taking care of.
I did not see you again for a
couple of months until one evening you showed up in the western garden of the
house. At the time, I lived with Panther and Sunny. Panther, a tuxedo-clad,
muscular male cat, chased you away.
However, you kept coming back. And
I had to break up fights between Panther, who was defending his territory, and you
several times.
As I was welcoming you, Panther grudgingly
conceded some space to you. You began coming to rest on the somewhat flat
boulder in the succulent garden by the steps to the front door of the house. Panther
sat across the steps on the retaining wall to keep a close eye on you. It
became clear to me that you wanted to live with me in the house. I named you
Siah, which means black in Farsi. I put a towel on top of the flat rock so you
would be comfortable. I began serving you canned food, which you ate with great
appetite. I spent time sitting by you and talking to you. You gained confidence
to explore the garden and liked to sit under the rosemary bush opposite the
front door. It gave you a shady, safe
spot, and you could also get a glimpse of the house's interior as I left the
front door wide open.
Until that time, I had never
touched you. To break the ice, one evening I leaned against the retaining
cement wall by the rosemary bush with my back to you. After some time, you approached
me, smelled me, and then took a superficial bite of my bare arm and ran away.
Although my arm was bleeding, I was
very happy because I knew it was the behavior of a cat that likes me but is too
afraid to get close to me yet. It was a sign of affection, tinged with a slight
fear of the unknown, not an angry attack. Later, when we became great friends, you
liked to bite my hand and arm gently as a sign of affection. Nuppy, the first
cat I became friends with, also a muscular male cat, expressed his love by
biting me gently.
My beloved Siah,
You remember how every evening
before I closed the front door to go to bed, I asked you: “Do you want to come
in, Siah?” You did not, and soon after I closed the door, you went away; I did
not know where. I feared for your safety as there were coyotes in the area.
You gradually came into the house,
and one evening in October, you walked into a trap I had set for you, with tuna
inside. I took you to VCA PetCare East Veterinary Hospital in Santa Rosa. The
next day you were examined, vaccinated, and neutered. The veterinarian who
examined you estimated, based on your teeth, that you were probably about 5
years old in 2017.
* *
*
Within a month after you came into
the house, I lost Sunny to kidney failure and lung cancer (Here is my Farewell
to Sunny). Sunny was a gift to me on
Christmas of 2011, when I found a tiny orange cat under the mailboxes. A female
cat, she was pure sweetness and quickly bonded with me. Sunny was a lap cat,
which I had never had before. She and I watched movies together, and she slept
next to me on the bed each night. Somehow, the universe sent you to be with me
as I was about to lose Sunny.
My beloved Siah,
You remember how you and Panther fought
so badly every so often that I had to take one of you to Analy Veterinary
Hospital for treatment. But you gradually accepted each other and shared the
house. Panther liked sleeping in the loft, and you preferred sleeping with me.
It was wonderful to see the two of you resting next to each other. A few times,
I saw Panther licking your face. Sometimes you slept next to each other on top
of the refrigerator where there is hardly room for two large cats. Panther also
preferred to make his morning and night rounds in the neighborhood. You, on the
other hand, were a home buddy, preferring to stay close to me.
Thus, I spent a lot more time with
you than I did with Panther, although I brushed him each morning and played
with him with a feathered wand while he lay on his side on the step to the
loft.
When Panther died in March of 2025,
it hurt me deeply because I felt I did not express my love for him as much as I
did for you. I mourned him for three months, and he was on my mind daily for about
a year.
My Beloved Siah,
As you may know, for me, it is as
important, if not more important, to give love as to receive it. You provided
me with ample opportunities to express my love for you and expressed your
affection for me daily.
You followed me wherever I went
around the house or in the garden to help me carry out my daily tasks. When I sat down to write, eat my meal, or
watch a show, you sat by me. It was such a pleasure when you and Panther walked
with me to give treats for the neighborhood goats or when I went to the Yoga
Room to exercise. We were like a small family.
When I sat in bed to put drops in
my eye for glaucoma after my daily shower, about five in the afternoon, you sat
on my lap facing me. This was quality time for us as I caressed you with the
tip of my fingers, starting by the sides of your mouth, going over your
whiskers, around your ears, and across you back to your tail. I could see in your eyes that you were
relaxing and becoming very comfortable, stretching your body, your head on my
chest, along my body, while gently purring.
At bedtime, we repeated this
ritual, except I was lying down to sleep and would grab you and lay you down on
my side, my head near yours, and I would shower you with kisses while telling
you how much I loved you. Your body relaxed, and you purred softly. This lasted
a short time as you would move down to sleep between my legs, using my knee as
your pillow after grooming yourself.
You knew that after a while I had
to pull my leg out from under your body so I could sleep on my side. But even then,
I would press you with my calves.
Sometime during the night, you
would come up to put your head in my armpit or on my shoulder while laying your
body alongside mine. I knew you needed affection, so I kissed you, ran my hand
along your body, and wrapped you with the sheet that covered me. We then both fell
asleep, for you briefly because you preferred sleeping between my legs.
At night, when I had to use the
bathroom, you would follow me, pressing your head against my leg. I knew you
wanted me to walk you to the food buffet in the living room. As I headed that
way, I talked to you sweetly to you. I then encouraged you to eat what you
liked. After you started eating, I walked back to go to bed. You soon joined
me, and we fell asleep.
My beloved Siah,
Sometimes when I lay in bed next to
you at night, I reconsider my life, which I feel very grateful for, as I think I
have done much of what I wanted. Except for a lack of a lasting romantic
relationship. My relationship with cats, especially with you, has convinced me
that I could be fulfilled and very happy in any loving relationship. We loved
each other without expectations or reservations. I was always happy being with
you, except when you were not feeling well, and that was because I did not want
you to suffer or I did not want to lose you. In our social culture, the
emphasis on romantic love is an exaggeration. Love is the answer, love of being.
After being with twenty feral cats
in my life, I know how cats and other nonhuman animals suffer at the hands of
humans. In your case, I often wondered why a cat as sweet as you was dumped in
this neighborhood. Until I noticed a trauma you might have suffered. You were
as fearful of little girls’ screeching voices as of seeing a coyote near the
house. You would run inside, go straight to the loft, and hide under the bed. I
hypothesize that you had probably lived in a house with a small girl and were
probably adopted as her “pet.” She treated you as if you were her toy, handling
you in ways you did not like; she would chase you, screaming at you. At some
point, you might have scratched the little girl, and that is why you were
dumped in this neighborhood.
My beloved Siah,
I have been wondering why we
discovered advanced lymphoma that had invaded your vital organs without any
advanced warning from your veterinarians.
Looking through your veterinarian
records, I discovered that two years ago, in June 2024, Dr. Baldwin, then your
veterinarian, had referred you to TruVet Specialty in Petaluma. The referral
note by Dr. Baldwin reads: “Recent history ~6 months of waxing and waning
lethargy, not eating/drinking, afebrile- transiently responsive to supportive
care.” That referral was made after I took you to see Dr. Baldwin three times for
the same ailment.
At TruVet, they hospitalized you
for two nights and ran a battery of tests that again found nothing. I met with a
veterinarian for a consultation. Instead, I received a phone call from the lead
veterinarian, whose name I do not recall, who explained to me how to treat you
with Prednisone. She did not give me a diagnosis.
Dr. Baldwin, who must have received
a report from TruVet, did not tell me what they had found or why Prednisone
treatment was prescribed. I only knew that it worked. You started eating and
drinking normally within 10 days! I was
so happy that I did not pursue the question of why it was prescribed and why it
worked.
After reading about lymphoma in
cats after you were gone, I realize that you might have had an early case of
lymphoma that was treated successfully with Prednisone. The disease went into
remission. But it never goes away. It came back with vengeance.
Had I been informed, would it have
made a difference in planning your care in the past two years?
My beloved Siah,
I cannot help but consider that if
you were my child treated like this by the medical profession, it would be
considered gross negligence and malpractice.
Why are veterinarians not held to
the same standards? Without a doubt, because in our society the lives of
nonhumans are considered less valuable than those of humans or even
subordinated to them, as in the case of billions of farm animals being
slaughtered for food for humans.
My Beloved Siah,
Our relationship was so central to
my life that I miss you everywhere I go, and in most things I do. One day soon
after I lost you, I truly felt I had no reason to live. Nothing as important as
you exists in my life.
Still, I console myself that if you
were born in 2012, then you did live a long life. All of us arrive on the
planet with an expiration date. The second law of thermodynamics: the total
entropy of an isolated system always increases over time. A hot cup of coffee
gets cold over time. I venture to say that the last nine years of your life, at
least, were comfortable and filled with love and affection between us.
I do not believe in the afterlife.
But if there is one, I pray to join you in cat heaven to rekindle our love for
each other for an eternity.
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