Shortly after the saga of "Jocelyn is too allergic to these kittens and now everyone is sad except her cousin since he has a new cat because of it", we picked up and moved to a new house. But my dad had decided we had been a cat-free family for too long! Who knows what inspired him to risk another kitten when there was a highly allergic child at home?

(I mean, I know what it was. It was the flyer someone posted at his workplace about free kittens. That was the inspiration.)



My dad was at least smart enough to loop-in my mom on the decision this time! So we drove out as a family to go pick up Pogo together. Originally my dad had signed up for two kittens, but they could only manage to catch the one. When the family offered up another kitten a week later, Pogo was having NONE of it and so we meekly returned the kitten.

She started out as a pretty playful and cuddly kitten (don't they all?) and we quickly established the rule that if Pogo chose to sleep in your lap, you were not allowed to move until she was ready to leave. Sadly, that rule didn't stay in-play for long as Pogo became more cranky and less cuddly as she got older. She loved us - her family - and tolerated being picked up for about ten seconds, but anyone else was liable to get a scratch or two for their troubles if they fell prey to her "bear-trap" ways. If you held an inanimate object out to her - like a golf club - she would happily rub her head against that! But human hands were Enemy Number One.

By my dad's own admission, Pogo was his favourite cat. She would most often hang out on the arm or the back of the couch and accompany him while he watched TV, or napped behind me while I studied. She was affectionate, but only just, which made her a real cat in my dad's eyes. When one of us would be away for an extended period, she would roam the house carrying a feather duster in her mouth in some kind of weird tribute to our loss. The weekends we'd go away to the ranch, we'd always find the fuzzy squirrel figures dragged up onto the windowsill of my bedroom, keeping watch because we suspected she was too lazy to. We once did the unforgivable by moving houses and then immediately leaving her for two weeks while we gallavanted through parts of Asia. When my mom and I returned first, she let us know how she felt by giving each of us two swipes each. She then meowed at me non-stop through that first night back and I spent the rest of the week tripping over her because she was always underfoot or crouched in the doorway of a room I was occupying, keeping tabs of my every move. By the time my dad got back, her fury had cooled so she simply ignored him for a week before returning to her regular routine

Pogo was also - by everyone's estimation - the dumbest of all our cats. She got stuck under the bed after her spay due to her e-collar being so wide. After we got together and moved the mattress and rescued her, she waited until we replaced the mattress and dove straight under again, much to our aggravation. She used to flip out at the smallest things and could not catch or kill a bug to save her life. I have watched her turn around and walk straight into a wall before, and we have wasted many an afternoon just laughing at her and her newest dumb antic.

The other thing about her being less well-equipped in the intelligence department is that she rarely did anything naughty, like try to steal food or escape, because it just never seemed to occur to her. She was also a massive coward, never making any attempt to defend her territory from wandering cats (my dad had to rescue her from under the porch) or temporary visitors (an attempt was made to adopt another cat. Pogo hunger-striked until we gave him back).

We had Pogo for 13 years, and she started to mellow out in her older age, though all my friends who bore "battle scars" didn't see it that way. When she deteriorated unexpectedly and rapidly, I remember saying to my mom "She's my cat. I'll pay for her medical expenses." I was ready to slap down $5000 for hospitalization, dialysis, the works, before the veterinarian gently explained that they could try everything and still not save her. So we made the decision not to have her suffer and said our goodbyes at the emergency clinic. 

(I was so distressed I threw up an hour later while visiting the clinic I had previously been employed at when the veterinarian I had previously worked with wanted to debrief with me over what had happened.) 

We were bereft for a long time. The house felt so empty without her. Waking up every morning not to see her crouched in my doorway was painful. And my mom kept saying "No more cats! It's too hard!"

Well, we all know that's not how things go in our household....