Sadness and joy in the loss of Alaska

There is no-one in the world except God who has time for me,which is why the flowers walk for Him and the last of the ants.The forget-me-not asks for a brighter shine in her blue eyes and the ant asks for greater strength for carrying a piece of straw,and the bees ask Him for a more triumphal song among the purple roses.

And God is present in everything. Without hoping to, the old lady found her cat by the well and her cat found her mistress. Great was the delight of both and greater still when God left them together and wished for them this marvellous friendship which  lasted fourteen years.

This beautiful poem by Edith Sodergran was given to me recently and it holds a special poignancy for me. Not long before this, my cat Alaska, or Sweet Cheeks as I liked to call her, died. She was a very special little cat who had led a chequered life. She belonged to the daughter of a friend of mine and in her first eight years she had quite a few different homes. And then four years ago, she came to me! She arrived late in the afternoon with all her goods and chattels and a very vocal request for an early dinner. We eyed each other tentatively throughout the evening and when I retired to bed she was curled up in my family or  ‘soul’ room as I prefer to call it, sound asleep. I woke the next morning to the feeling of a heavy weight on my chest and my first thought was “I am  having a heart attack”. Then I opened my eyes,  and green eyes gazed back at me. Great relief – not a  heart attack, at least not a physical one, yet –  a heart attack nonetheless! Our marvellous friendship had begun!

We had a few missteps – particularly when I tried to break her habit of sharpening her claws on my lounge chairs. A fruitless exercise and I resorted to the latest home decor fashion of using throws on the chairs.  She loved these, and snuggled happily on my lap as I sat listening to music or watching TV. Her favourite spot on a hot day, was under the camellia tree and on winter days she basked in the sun by the yellow cassia bush.  She was a very vocal cat and when I arrived home in the evenings she would be sitting on the windowsill, demanding entrance and attention.

Like Sodergran’s old lady and the cat by the well, Alaska and I delighted in our friendship and I miss her very much. She rests now under the cassia, guarded over by a solar light in the form of an angel playing a violin. I feel much sadness at her passing, but I remember with gratitude, the beauty, happiness and joy she brought to my life in those four short years.