It’s taken me a few days to write this post, as this hit me really hard. Two Tuesdays ago, June 4th, I had to say goodbye to my eldest cat Zoe. It has been such a hard loss that it has taken me this long to feel okay even writing a memorial post for her.

The night that we let her go, there was a powerful thunderstorm and the power went out. To me, it was as if the heavens themselves had opened up at Zoe’s passing.

Zoe meant even more to me because she was my first cat. I had grown up in a dog family, and though my dad ended up with a cat Cleo for many years, she wasn’t my own. I had many friends with cats, and had grown more fond of them as I grew older, but hadn’t adopted one myself. When I started dating Beth, I spent time with her cats, and that fondness grew. Finally, after meeting a friendly and quirky neighborhood cat that I named Eleanor, I resolved to adopt a kitty as my own.

Beth and I went to the city animal control, and visited with a number of younger cats. Zoe stood out immediately, curling up into my lap the moment she was put into the room with us. From then on, it was clear she was meant to be with me. People often say that “cats choose their parents,” and it was undeniably true for Zoe and me.

These early photos don’t do justice to the amazing eyes she had, like pieces of pure emerald. She was a kitty who seemed like royalty to me, and she was as dignified and beautiful as one would expect a queen to be.

She was a playful girl. One of her early traits that always stood out to me was her unique sidesliding technique for chasing toys. Instead of getting up to pounce on something, she would simply push herself on the carpet and slide to grab the toy.

Zoe could get away with such tricks because she was incredibly small and light. At her heaviest, I think she weighed nine pounds. When we let her go, she was under four.

Her lightness also made her a climber, and she would always be finding new things to climb onto or into, such as drawers. Later in life, I had to always keep a dresser drawer open for her to climb into, after which she would climb behind it into the drawer below, an impenetrable fortress for her.

Even near the end of her life, when she was mostly blind and three-legged, she would still happily jump up onto the furniture and find herself a good vantage point.

Zoe was the start of a cat obsession for Beth and I. Our next adoptee was Sabrina, who came to us very sick, and though the two of them didn’t always get along, Zoe and Sabrina did play with each other.

If Sabrina hadn’t grown into a cat nearly twice Zoe’s size, I think the two of them would’ve continued playing together. But Zoe never backed down from Sabrina when the two of them got into a spat. Once I was sitting on the couch and heard a ruckus, and turned towards the dining room doorway just in time to see Zoe literally flying through the air, one front paw raised, on the attack. The two of them were almost martial arts fighters at times.

Nevertheless, the pair eventually came to an understanding, and though I suspect Zoe would’ve preferred to be an only cat, she got along well with the others most of the time.

Zoe didn’t start out a lap cat, but in her later years she always wanted to be in someone’s lap, whether in my lap while I was lying in bed or Sarah’s lap while she watched TV downstairs.

I’ll always wonder if Zoe was related to my much younger kitty Cookie, who we rescued a few years after Zoe. The two have almost identical markings and both have personalities with just a little bit of a temper.

Zoe could be cranky at times but she was incredibly loving and caring. One trait that I will always remember her for is that she would always come to comfort someone who was crying, whether it was me, my wife, or my roommate. Zoe really cared about us, and wanted us to know.

She was also always curious, and always wanted to be a part of whatever we were doing. If I was playing a boardgame, Zoe would want to be in the middle of it. She managed to scrub our terraforming mission to Mars one night.

Another time, she opted to be the final boss in a round of fantasy roleplaying.

She was so eager to play, we were even tempted to give her her own character sheet in games.

It didn’t matter if it was boardgames or LEGO, Zoe wanted to be part of everything.

Overall, Zoe had a really blessed and comfortable life, and we were happy to have her with us. She seemed to love life herself, and overcame a number of serious conditions later when we were prepared to say goodbye. She inexplicably broke her front leg in 2023, which led first to a surgery to rebuild the leg and then a second surgery to remove it when the first didn’t take. She came through both surgeries, and even blindness and only three legs didn’t stop her from enjoying her food and her life.

But nothing lasts forever, and I suspect the two surgeries exacerbated her existing heart condition. We ended up having to run her to the emergency vet in April of 2024 when she was struggling to breathe, and she was diagnosed with congestive heart disease. At that point, we again thought we would have to let her go, but she rallied on the medication and came back to spend a little more time with us.

Finally, the clash between her heart disease and kidney disease led to an impasse, and we had to say goodbye. I had feared and dreaded having to do this with Zoe, but it was the right time. She passed away in my arms, with Sarah petting her, and I am honored to have been there for her at the end.

There is so much more I want to say about Zoe, because I don’t really want to let her go. I still miss her so much. The only reason I have ever hoped that there is an afterlife is so that I might be able to see Zoe, Sabrina, Goldie, and my other dear departed felines again, waiting to curl up next to me.

For now, I will have to content myself with all the happiness that we brought each other, and all the memories of her that I will always have. Rest in peace, Zoe.

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