Dax

Dax the Cat died on Monday.

Dax was an American cat, rescued from the SPCA when we lived in Washington 17 years ago. I spoke to Number 2 Son that evening where he was holding a celebration of life wake in his apartment with brother and partners accompanied by a lot of good food and drink.  We spoke of lots of memories in those 17 years. When we left Canada over 3 years ago to come here, Dax went to live with Mike. I had been having recurring fantasies of Dax coming back to sit under our new pergola in our new house in British Columbia, but at that age a fantasy is all it was. Dax was perfectly content dozing his way into old age where he was.

Besides, he hated to travel. Oh did he hate it. Unfortunately he had to travel a lot as we navigated from city to cottage and back every year but he didn't make it easy on anyone, himself included. Some years he'd howl all the way there, other times he'd be sedated and more or less OK. Except when he wasn't, and would end up puking, peeing, pooping, you name it, necessitating pulling over the car to stop for some unpleasant cat carrier cleanouts. Even trips to the vet down the road were a big production. As soon as he saw the carrier he'd hide.

One year I drove myself from Washington up to the cottage in Ontario. Well I wasn't really alone. Our station wagon was crammed to the roof with two kids, one Grandma, coolers, suitcases, Super Soakers, life jackets, toys, books, food, and other odds and ends. And Dax. Food, water dish, cat litter and litter pan. We had to stop for the night in a hotel somewhere in New York State, unpacking and repacking. What a production! By the time I got to the Canadian border, I must have been quite a sight to the immigration guy.

"Where are you going?"
"The cottage". (Duh).

Dax was a very small kitten when he came to live with us. He had been rescued from the Mean Streets of Bethesda and when we saw him in his cage he was frantic to get out, climbing the wire walls, sticking his little paws through the holes. "Take me, Take me!!!" he called to us. So we did.

He was definitely meant to be. Every week at Howard's office they used to assign new passwords, and it just so happened that that particular week his password happened to be "ADDADAX". Coincidence? We think not.

He didn't take well to the move to the new house 8 years ago. He hid under the couch for a couple of weeks and never wanted to go out, which was most unusual as he loved to be outside. It was a brand new house in a brand new subdivision and for a while the back yard was just an open field of dirt. But when we soon fenced in the property and built a pergola and started the garden, Dax felt safer I guess and stayed outside a lot. I'd see him through the kitchen windows in his favorite nap spot under the pergola.

We "see" Dax everywhere. Very often we will pass a tabby cat in Bangkok or Viet Nam or Istanbul or wherever and we stop and say "Dax! What are you doing here?" That will likely continue. But until we meet again, I will think of him with great fondness wherever he is under that Great Pergola in the sky. He was a great cat.