Stripes, 1995? - 2010

We had to put our dear kitty, Stripes, to sleep last Wednesday, September 18.

She fell down around 9:15 pm, and could not get up again. Both hind legs seemed paralyzed. She was panting and crying, and could not hold up her head. Whatever happened must have been very painful and frightening. I carried her downstairs and felt as if she wanted to use her litterbox, which she did. But then she fell down again. All we could think of to do was rush her to the local animal emergency medical care facility.

There, they could not give us hopeful news. They gave Stripes a massive dose of pain killers in order to examine her. They said the blood glucose in her hind legs was around 100, and double that in the front legs, which seemed to indicate lack of blood flow to the hind legs. They thought that meant a blood clot had lodged in her aorta and cut off blood to the second hind leg. Her heartbeat was also irregular. They thought it was a stroke or a heart attack.

We felt that Stripes's time had come. We wanted her to be jealed and whole, but did not want the cure to be more painful than the illness. We felt the time had come to release her from this life without Maris.

We told her over and over how much we loved her, and how grateful we were that she had come to live with us. We thanked her for all the love she gave to Maris over the years. We called on Bast and Great Mystery to look after her in the Spirit World.

We were with her to the very end. I feel sure Maris was there to meet Stripes on The Other Side.

We carried her home and buried her under the cherry tree in our back yard, with other members of our animal family.

We will always love you, Stripes. You are the best, most beautiful cat who ever lived.

Dream, August 16, 2010

I dreamed that I was hugging Maris. We were surrounded by pure sly blue light, rose light, and white light. He was speaking in questions, He said to me, "What am I feeling? am I happy?"

I am not sure of the meaning of the conversation. Is he trying to figure out how he feels? Am I asking myself what he is feeling, or what i am feeling?

Was it hard for Maris to do that in life? is it easier now? is he having to learn it all over againnow?

Here we are again, speaking in questions.

But the feeling of hugging Maris again was wonderful, and something positive i can associate with him, rather than so many regretful, sad thoughts.

Stripes

Stripes loved Maris. He was her favorite human. She sat on his lap for hours when he played computer games, and she liked to sleep on top of him.

Stripes is not feeling well. She has been limping.

Something happened to her leg during a time when I was not with her.

Was it an injury, or was it a disease? was it due to my neglect? was it something I could have prevented?

whatever is happening to Stripes is similar to what happened to Maris insofar as I am finding myself asking the same questions: was this something I could have prevented? did I cause it to happen?

Stripes has retained her sweet and loving disposition. She is a strong and brave cat.

Her vet, Dr. Currigan, says catss' behavior reflects "Survival of the fittest." when they don't feel well, they hide, so that they survive.

Stripes has been stoical, just like Maris.

Here is the latest from her vet:
"We do not have all of Stripes’ laboratory results in yet, but we do have most results back. On her blood and urine tests, the only significant finding was an elevated white blood cell count. An increased white blood cell count is consistent with either infection or inflammation (and sometimes with cancer as well – usually because of the associated inflammation of the cancer). Everything else on her blood work looks fine (kidneys, liver, thyroid, protein level, etc.). Her blood potassium was slightly low, but that may have just been due to stress. Stripes’ urine was well concentrated (or not watery) – which means her kidney function is good. We may want to put Stripes on an antibiotic for the high white blood cell count, but I would like to hold off on that until we get all the test results back.

On the radiologist report, he, too, is concerned about the masses in the lungs - with cancer, or infection (fungal, bacterial), parasites (less likely) being possibilities.

We do not yet have back they results of the aspirate of the leg swelling, but hopefully I will have those back by Friday and will call you then."

Eventually we will get a fuller idea of what 's up with Stripes.

But she has missed maris very much.

She sits outside his room when the door is closed. We brought her upstairs, away from the other cats who might bother her, in an attempt to help her get some rest and relaxation.

She has taken up residence in Maris's room. So her food, water, and litter tray are there too, so that Stripes does not have to use her sore leg to get up and down the stairs.

When she is there, I think she communes with maris. Maybe she feels safe there, where she was always happiest.

I think she really wants to be with Maris.

Maris's Nissan

I just learned yesterday that Maris's Nissan is finally being auctioned off today.

At least I think it is.

This year has been a series of one heartache after another.

Maris loved his Nissan. He worked on it and cared for it in a very devoted way. He had it running extremely well. He loved going for long rides all over Oahu in it. It brought him a lot of happiness.

Then he lent it to someone.

And the Nissan got totaled.

I remember maris calling me, very down, and practically in tears. I felt his heart was broken. And my own heart broke for him.

Maris was so far away. I could not reach through the wires to hug him. I did what I could to console him. I am not sure it help much. All I could do was say helplessly, over and over, "Maris, I am so sorry that happened." HNot much else I could do.

It was one if a series of blows that hurt him all through 2009.

Maris bought another car, because he really needed a car, and began working on that one, too. But it was not as good as the Nissan, and he felt a bit discouraged in spite of continuing to work on it.

I recently acquired a new car, too.

It got me to thinking about vehicles in a general way.

How our cars can be one of the outer faces we present to the world, and a shell that protects and shields our frail physical beings. How we should be more grateful to them than we are. They carry precious cargo, and enable us to do things we could never do on our own...at leas5t not without as horse and / or a wagon.

Maris's Nissan served him well, and I am grateful to it.

Which is why it broke my heart that it was so neglected.

We are the soul of our cars. We inhabit them, almost the way we inhabit our houses, and the way our sould inhabit our bodies.

Our bodies are the temples of our soul and spirit. They are the physical vehicle that conveys our mind and soul through teh physical world, and anchors our brain to the physical world so that it can picks up tghoughts and our hearts can pick up intuitions.

We need to respect and honor our bodies more. We need to respect and honor our cars more, too.

Over the years I have thought many unpleasant things about my car. I have owned a couple lemons. I have owned a series of extremely elderly cars that became black holes that sucked in all the money in the world, and spent more time in the repair shop than in my garage.

In the last couple years, I began to thank my car every morning as I walked away from it in the parking lot. I thanked it for getting me to work safely. I thanked it for all the times it started right up, in the coldest days of winter. I thanked it for its brakes not failing at crucial moments. I thanked it for not over-heating at inconvenient times. I thanked it for letting its timing belt break on a quiet side street close to home rather than on the highway. I thanked it for doing its best in spite of my tremendous ignorance about cars, and my semi-benign neglect.

I wanted so much to give my car good thoughts, and surround it with good energy, rather than think horrible things about how the car has done much damage to the ecology of our country; and that we are responsible for enabling the oil companies to work their evil will on the world. I wanted those things for Maris's Nissan, too.

That is why it broke my heart when, months ago, I first learned the poor Nissan was sitting there, neglected, where it was towed after it was totaled.

I had thought that we had given permission to deal with the Nissan constructively back when we were in Hawaii for Maris's memorial. I assumed it would be given to a worthy charity, or even to a worthy individual. It certainly deserved better than to sit and languish after it had served Maris so faithfully.

As soon as I learned of that instance, I contacted people and made inquiries to see what could be done. We tried to contact charities on Oahu, but the ones we contacted seemed to be the wrong ones, and did not seem to want to help us. So we allowed the people who were actually on Oahu to deal with it. We sent the title, so there would be no problems in transferring ownership to the

My life has been a series of mistaken assumptions. I try to follow up on things, but my attempts at followup seem to also be a series of mistaken assumptions.

I truly thought that this time the car had been properly treated and towed away to wherever they keep them until the auction takes place. Upon failing to locate a charity that seemed to want the car, we gave permission to auction it off so that Hickam Base would somehow benefit in some small way.

Imagine the shock and discouragementI felt yesterday upon learning that the car was to be auctioned today, but that it had been left sitting still in that same place all these months.

It really deserved better treatment.

Many things went through my mind. How Oahu was so far away....and I had no way to know what was really going on with the car....and how I really had no way of knowing what was going on withg Maris.

I also thought that now we knew why every now and then a wave of low energy would pass through us...just as sometimes it had when Maris was going through something difficult. But we were so far away, and sometimes maris would not tell us much about what was going on with him....and no one told us much about what was going on with his car, either.

I think about the disrespectful way in which we treat our own temples, our own bodies. How we show how we really feel about our fellow drivers by the way we treat each other on the road....behavior we would not engage in quite as freely face to face, because we allow our cars to take the hits for us...as if they were some sort of shield we hide behind.

I think about how our physical embodiment is so fragile, and how dependent our spirit is on this fragile shell that anchors us to this physical plane.

I think of that dear Nissan, irreparably damaged. I think of my dearest, dearest, most treasured Maris, irreparably damaged. I cry out in agony for them.

Is there a heaven for cars? Do androids dream of electric sheep?

Be at peace, dear golden Nissan. thank you for being so good to Maris. Thank you for taking him places, and bringing him home again. Thank you for serving him so well.

Forgive me for not dealing sufficiently well with the enormous distance to Oahu. Forgive me for not following through all the way to the end. Forgive myinadequacy.

Thank you, dear beautiful golden Nissan, for being so good to Maris. I love you and thank you

Thank you, dear beautiful Maris, for being my son for this all too short span if time. I love you and I thank you.

I will see Maris again, in the spirit world. I am doubtful about the car, though, .and I am regretful for not treating it better. It did not deserve this kind of end.

Farewell, dear golden Nissan, and thank you yet again. I wish you did not have to leave Maris so soon

I love you forever, dear Maris, I wish you didnot have to leave us so soon.

I am so sorry I failed you both.

Atterbury Circle Video

MSgt. Ben David shared this YouTube video with us. It shows Maris's memorial
brick, and the surrounding monument, so you can better picture where it is.

Click here.

Winter Solstice 2006

Here is our dear friend Anna, who later helped us so much regarding Oahu, its deities, special inhabitants, etc.


...and a Merry Yule to you, too!

Snow 2006

We cheerfully photographed and sent these pictures of Chicago weather on December 1, 2006 to Maris to show him what he was missing. Actually, he loved snow, thunderstorms, and other drastic kinds of weather.

Maris's last birthday celebration

We did not know that Maris's 21st birthday would be his last. What would we have done differently? don't know...we tried to make each one as perfect as possible, because you never know...each day may well be your last.

here are some highlights of good times with good friends and family:

We were notified by MSgt Ben A. David, First Sergeant, 8th Intelligence Squadron, that a memorial brick for Maris has been placed at the Atterbury Circle Memorial, at the center of Hickam Air Force Base.

MSgt David wrote: "The brick is now a lasting part of Hickam, and a reminder to all who see it of Maris' incredible contributions to not only the 8th Intelligence Squadron, but to the Air Force, and to the security of our great nation. From your 8 IS Ohana..."

Altar

We have a special place in our dining room for Maris.

On this altar are his ashes, several ankhs, his picture and some of his special items such as a little knife, and his dog tags. There is a tiny bear he gave to Philip, and offerings other people have made such as a little wax behive and an aromatherapy burner from Demetria. There are a special Hawaii cup and a plate for food and other offerings. I like to offerhis favorite things, such as blueberries. Sometimes we just offer what we have, so he is included, and hopefully he isenjoying sharing with us.

The picture over the altar is the goddess Persephone,Queen of the Underworld, who weland sheltersthe souls and takes care of them until they are ready to be reborn. This particular Persephone is a pre-Raphaelite painting by Rosetti.

Ray.s Birthday 2010

We took Ray out for his birthday on June 23, 2010. The plan was dinner at Fat Willy's BBQ Shack. As we walked out the door, tornado warning sirens sounded.

Maris used to love this kind of weather; in fact, all of us do. So we went out for dinner, and felt that the weather was a message from Maris that he was with us and having fun.

After a fabulous dinner of BBQ brisket, which brought back memories of our visit to San Antonio for Maris's graduation at Lackland, we headed home. The storm was over, and there was a huge rainbow that stretched across the entire sky.

The rainbow brought back memories of our visit to Hickam AFB in Hawaii. Again, the rainbow made us feel Maris was with us.

The storm and the rainbow were his birthday gift to Ray.

A New Twist

Here is a new twist on the past.

I am dumping old emails from my work email account. We are getting ready to move to a new buuilding, with all new equipment, and we were told to do this.

As I read through the old emails from a year ago, I am horrified to discover that this is a countdown to Maris's death.

2009 was a bad year for me as well as for Maris. I am reading old correspondence pertaining to the Glenview Veterans Oral History Project, and it is bringing back all the misery I went through with that. That misery is co-mingling with the misery I now feel knowing that a year ago, Maris only had 4 more months to live.

If only I had known.....of course ,this has been the mantra all along.

When people are dying of a terminal illness, even if they are in misery, they (and their loved ones) can still make some plans for how to spend their remaining time.

It causes me endless misery that Maris may have been carrying out plans he had made for his remaining time. We will never know. The things he did that summer might have been things he had been planning for a long time as ways he wanted to spend his final time. When I talked to him about all the things he still wanted to do, I thought we were talking about what he wanted to do before leaving Hawaii...not before leaving this world.

Perhaps Maris had the foresight to plan. But i was too blind, and had no foresight. I thought we still had years remaining to us. I had no idea my son was dying of a terminal disease called suicide.

If I had realized he had this illness, I would have taken a medical leave of absence and done with him all the really important things that I needed to do with him, and that I thought we would do when he came home.

But that was not part of his plan for himself.

This is one of those mistakes from which I will never recover.

Mary Kelly, 1931-2010

Another reason I did not have time to blog was because the last few weeks were filled with attempts to help care for our dear friend, Mary Kelly, who died on May 24.

Mary loved Maris. She felt she had a special connection with him from the time he came into this world. She was devastated when he died, and I am not surprised that she has followed him into the spirit world a mere 7 months later.

The penultimate time I saw Mary, when it seemed clear she was dying, and was barely conscious, I asked her to carry my love to Maris. I told her I was envious that she would see him before I would; but that she was so blessed...because she would be seeing him.

I wonder if he met her when she passed over.

Mary's heart was so full of generous love for so many people. I am sure she is having a great time in the spirit world. I pray Maris is having a good time with her, and that they are getting caught up with each other, too.

Getting Caught Up

I have not blogged in a while.

My thoughts continue to be consumed with remorse, grief, and horror.

Every day I ask myself over and over what is wrong with me? How could I not know the extent to which Maris was depressed and suffering? why did it never occur to me that he might take his own life?

I thought depression was something people just put up with, until the day they overcame it. It never occurred to me that people sometimes die of depression.

How could I be so ignorant?

I have not read anything in the last 7 or 8 months that was not in some way about depression. Every sentence i read is a horrible realization.

Is this picture the face of depression?

To be aware of depression, you have to read between the lines, and watch for tiny clues that do not add up...and to take them VERY SERIOUSLY.

I will never again take ANYTHING for granted.