Day Thirty-One: Ten Years, It's a Killer

I think I'm starting to figure it out. It's going to happen every ten years. When I was 27, back in the year 2000, my Mother died. Flash forward ten years to age 37 and my favorite cat died. My marriage died. A long-time and very close friendship died. I'm not sure who died when I was 17, but when I was seven, I'm pretty sure my Grandfather Howdy died. So every ten years either I'm going to kill someone off, or they're going to go on their own, but if I were you, I'd stay the fuck away from me in 2020.

I knew I had to put Sylvia to sleep. On Monday, I called and made an appointment for Wednesday morning when I knew I'd be done with my last final of the semester. Sadly, when I got home from my final Tuesday night I found her in pain and so I did the only unselfish thing I could at that point, I took her to the emergency animal hospital to have her euthanized. It sucked. It sucked a lot and I'm going to be red and puffy for days, because I am a very ugly crier.

Here's the additional part of the sucking. It cost $200. Two. Hundred. Dollars. To hold my cat while a vet kills her. Really? How much to kill you? Because that might be worth it. It wasn't just the money. I called ahead to make sure they could do it and let them know the circumstances. When I arrived I signed a "Consent to Euthanize" form. It should seem very likely then that the two staff members on duty aside from the vet himself understood that this was Sylvie's last stand. Yet, the questions they asked as I stood crying, alone, at the counter beside my whimpering and gasping kitty, were the dumbest fucking questions one could imagine at such a time.

Among them was "Is Sylvia spayed?" "Is she up to date on her shots?" "How has she been feeling?"

Um, excuse me? I think the last is pretty obvious, and the first two? What the hell does it matter if she's spayed? I didn't bring her to the Emergency Animal Hospital of Charlotte at eleven o'clock at night on a Tuesday to get her laid. In five fucking minutes she's going to be dead, so what don't you suck my dick before I spay your gap-toothed ass?

I apologize for being so vulgar, I'm a little worked up and sad, angry, lonely and way, WAY too sober.

The point is, every ten years people, pets, and relationships start dropping like flies around me. I killed a great friendship with selfishness and insecurity. I killed my husband's love, trust, and possibly faith in women in general. I killed my cat by being erratic with her medicine over the last year. And since the rare disease that killed my Mother starts with the first three letters of my three letter given name, I kind of killed her too. I think I'm going to embark on a series of nine year relationships. That way no one has to die and the relationship will just naturally end of its own accord. Now, if only I could figure out what breed of pet only lives nine years or less, maybe I could break the curse.

I know I sound cavalier now, but I'm in between sobbing episodes so I thought I'd take this little break to fulfill my blogging obligation. Consider yourselves warned, hang around me and 2020 just ain't going to be your year sweetheart.