Bleating Off - 1. Off White Sox

Once upon a time there was a kitten named (changed the name to protect the innocent) Sox. He was a real mutt of an animal, but was so pale grey he was nearly white, long hair herringbone coat. At the time I had several other cats residing with me and Gordon. We lived right downtown in a microscopic community of almost 3000, but was 50 miles from Houston.

A business client had given Sox to me. He was barely six weeks old at the time. Ziggy, a darker grey tom, Sherman, a ginger Manx, and Ramses (Rom), a fawn colored Abyssinian fellow residents, along with myself, Bo Grant.

A poorly heated and cooled Roman revival monstrosity of a house was our home. It was only a three bedroom, but was well over three thousand square feet of house, not including a full basement (imagine that near Houston) and several outbuildings.

One of the outbuildings was a guesthouse Gordon’s father used as a weekend home.

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The three other cats played together well, but Rom tended to isolate. I’d brought him and Sherman with me when we moved from Houston. Sherman adapted quickly to the more rural environment: Rom, not so much. Ziggy was a foundling and was a particularly talented mouser.

Sherman and Ziggy adopted Sox, and took the little one on to train. In short order the kitten was seen scampering across the yard, or hiding among daylilies and azaleas in the back yard. I was most amused to watch the scamp attempt the stairs: one step up and then tumble back two.

I don’t think we’d been together more than a month when a neighboring tom almost killed Sox. I heard as the tom threw the kitten against our back door. I rushed to chase the cat off and scooped up poor Sox. He was lucky to have survived, but from then on the kitten was hunch backed.

Gordon worked in Houston. I am a realtor and I worked form home (One of our outbuildings was a small building I used for my office.)

The kitten had very long pale grey hair and a very long tail. He adored me and visa versa. One thing he did that really endeared him to me was after my evening work out and shower I’d be in shorts and a tee sitting at the computer. The little dickens would either walk very quickly past, or run, and always from right to left. Invariably and in mid pass, he’d wrap his tail boa-fashion around my right ankle, and like the little chanteuse he pretended to be would slink it over my bare skin.

Well we had a couple of years together, Sox and me. He’d run in and jump in my face, like all my cats did. He’d purr loudly, and demand to be petted.

There were a number of large, cat-chasing dogs in the area. I guess their owners thought it was a dog’s right to roam and chase things, because often the dogs were out on their own and ran as a pack at night. I was not aware of this until it was too late.

Gordon and I had been on vacation and were only back home for a day or so. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon. Gordon was upstairs watching the TV, or more probably porn…we weren’t getting along well. Anyway, I was on the computer. A neighbor calls with the news Sox is dead and told me where to find his body. The cat had met his doom. His body lay next to a highway half a block from home. I gave Sox body a cursory examination.

To this day I don’t know what killed him. I just know, that as I carried his lifeless body home for burial, my time with Sox was not over.

I can’t recall how many days after, one or two hundred, that it happened. I was at my computer, and it was early evening, before eight o’clock. It was late spring, or early summer. Our house was pretty warm. I noticed my feet were chilled just before I felt his tail wrap around my right ankle. I felt his fur drag across and even felt the tip of his tail tap both ankles, and then he was gone.

I guess it was his way of telling me goodbye.