One moment he was laying on my chest as I was talking on the phone.  The next minute he was vomiting and his back legs became paralyzed.  The vet called it, "throwing an embolysm."  I called it "living through a nightmare."  As though watching "Marley & Me" on the ten-hour flight from Istanbul last week wasn't enough of a tragedy.  That and listening to rap music for ten hours--from the headphones of the kid sitting next to me. 

Just like the dog in the movie, my cat Scendi brought a lot of humor to the decade that we knew each other.  Like when he "took a spang"--my grandma's term for rambunctiousness--and jumped onto the kitchen table, the laundry room counter and finally to the open doors of the cupboard above the refrigerator.  Not an easy feat for a cat who was pushing 20 lbs.  Lucky for him I don't have many pots and pans, so he had his own personal tree house-like area to store all his toys.   

Or when he would come upstairs to beat up the other cat at 5:30 a.m. because he knew that would wake me up so I could let him out or feed him.   Or when he would sleep on my car when I got home, putting his signature paw prints all over the windshield.  

Scendi--so named because I found him in the neighbor's apple tree (he wasn't the neighbor's cat, and yes I did ask them first before taking him home) and named after the Italian word for "come down".  The original plan was two kittens, named Scendi and Scali--go up and come down.  But the cat I got was better than I could have planned. 

Not only did he inspire humor while he was living, even as he was clinging to life at the vet's office, he still reminded me to lighten up.  During this whirlwind of activity that occurred, I heard the vet say, "I can give you a sedative, and that will make you feel better."  I said, "Are you talking to him or to me?"  She laughed.  So did I. 

She called me the next day to tell me he hadn't made it through the night.  Did I want to pick him up to bring him home and bury him?  Or, they could have their people, Furlong's Funeral Home, cremate him.  I said, "That won't work--he's a short-hair." 

Pets are our  humor heroes--always showing us how to take life and living more lightly.  Has your pet made you laugh today?