I'm crying in a café in Norrköping. Swedish artist Eva Dahlgren's song "Vem tänder stjärnorna" is playing.
In the lyrics Dahlgren asks "who makes me go/where I have not gone".
I remember yesterday, right before I had to leave home with Blixa. She was laying in the sun, gazing out into the street as she has done so many times before. I thought "this may be the last time she is at home" and cried.
I held her. She purred, which she always did. It feels so wrong and it makes me angry to write about her in the past tense, which I think is due to my wanting her to not be dead.
I held her and sat down, almost laid down, in our sofa. She put her back paws on my stomach and her front paws widely apart right in front of my neck, planting her face on mine, slobbering her tongue, lips, and nose onto me. She purred on, as expected.
She'd lost so much weight and yet her belly was so big. When a veterinarian explained that they had found multiple tumors in her pancreas, liver, and major vascular parts leading into her abdomen, they carefully recommended that we let Blixa sleep away, to translate directly from Swedish. Of course we did. The vet asked me if I wanted to come see Blixa. I did.
We said goodbye, I hung up, screamed, cried. I was in another place altogether. I couldn't connect with anything. For a second I felt like I'd just done it, like I'd just ordered the murder of my baby - that thought quickly left me. I thought of Blixa, her little head in my hands just a couple of hours earlier. I felt so bad for X, I didn't want her to feel any pain, to experience this. And naturally I told her straight away. She was in Norrköping, a city far away, on work training. I knew that we both felt the same way about Blixa. Keeping her alive after the operation would leave her in a pain that would undoubtedly increase and kill her. I am actually glad for that.
A friend wrote "[it] probably will be one of the most selfless choices you will ever have to make" which somehow resounds deeply in me.
I'm glad that Blixa was herself until her end. She wouldn't even pose properly in my last picture of her because she was so curious. Our little monkey child:
She was the most happy, lovingly suffocating in how much she always wanted to be close to X and myself, curious, lazy, totally nuts, and a complete bundle of Love.
God, she was so hyperkinetic as a kitten:
https://vimeo.com/5073515
...and a nutcase:
https://vimeo.com/4814296
The sweetest in the morning:
https://vimeo.com/4349470
The best to play with:
https://vimeo.com/3658743
God, how I loved and love her feeble attacks!
I love this video for how loudly she purred, a purr which only grew deeper in tone with age:
https://vimeo.com/4506362
She was the best. Ever. I'm so glad to be wearing big fucking black shades in this fucking café. Tears don't stop. I miss Blixa so indescribably much.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/13600248175/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/3407184545/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/5532209580/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/3355121219/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/5849919300/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/4340714680/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/5775453284/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/3459647663/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/3355120659/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/5944430596/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/27457941032/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/4381210809/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/4381211177/
Here's a picture of a miniscule Blixa with her siblings, when we visited her for the first time. Lena, who kept Kismet (Blixa's mother), was absolutely wonderful, I can't think of anybody better suited to breed cats. My god.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/3256865425/
Always so curious:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/5468242822/
She loved it when we made the bed. Used to jump around and be completely crazy. I loved it. She then used to go underneath the quilt and sleep. She loved a newly-made bed.
She and her sister, Lotta:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/4108702987/
I remember the first time they met...Blixa had stayed with us and then Lotta showed up. From the very beginning Blixa was literally chasing Lotta's tail:
...which Lotta did not enjoy:
They fairly quickly turned into best friends after that meet:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pivic/3548511538/
https://vimeo.com/4815411
And this, oh, this:
https://vimeo.com/56118467
There's so much sorrow right now but watching all of these films and pictures of Blixa makes me think of how her life has fared. She's never been ill before, and lived for nearly 9.5 years with two parents who loved her far beyond anything measurable. Our little girl. I'm glad to know that she has had a good life, charming everybody that she met. She was extremely easygoing, sociable, sweet, and was always seemed to know when one needed her comfort and love.
I am a much better person for having been blessed with having Blixa in my life, and I will always be grateful to Lena for allowing us to have her (and Lotta!), and to X, for not only wanting Blixa but for being the most loving, kindest, fun-loving, and controlling (whenever Blixa went rampant, for example when she had silently decided to open X's wardrobe a little and commenced by pawing all of X's clothes out onto the floor) parent that a cat could have. I love You, X.
There will never be enough words for me to describe what Blixa has meant for me, nor will her presence ever be gone, which is as I want it to be. She is my baby, and always will be, even though she is now gone.
I love You, Blixa.