Apifera Farm - where art, story, animals & woman merge. Home to artist Katherine Dunn

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Monday, November 09, 2020

My soul cat...Mister Mosely came as a leaf


Mister Moseley died early Sunday morning. We knew he was close Saturday night. I am so grateful he waited until morning as I was able to hold his little cold paws and clean his eyes and give him one last goodbye. I am deeply sad. I waited my entire life for a cat like Mister Mosely and when our eyes met at the shelter I knew. He was supposed to be my ‘grow old along with me” cat but nature was in charge. I am so grateful he could die with us in his home in his little spot...with Bear’s baby llama blanket under him.

 

The photo above was the last picture I took, maybe two days ago.One thing about being able to caretake a dying animal, you learn to look and accept that they are not the same animal they were...and you start to want them to let go, and you start to let go.  Mister Mosely's bile duct issue took over fast, so rapid. The weight fell off him in the last week and a half. And when I looked back at photos of him...it was heartbreaking... but also helped me accept it was time for me to let go and help him know I was ok to let go. I sent so much time with him this last month, but especially in the last week, cleaning him [something he'd stop doing], talking to him, making sure he got some water for comfort...but being so intimate with him was and is part of helping a caretaker see 'it is time now'. I'm grateful he could die at home.

His eyes said it all.

We have lost three of our house companions since last summer-Hughie the pug, Muddy, and now Mosely. I miss them all, and today as I washed all the Mosely blankets it brought back visions of Hughie sleeping in them, and how Bear used the llama blankie as a puppy.

There is a space between actual death and spirit awakedness  for me. In other words, the body is gone, and I feel that as a caretaker I need a small space of not seeing the body anymore before I can witness spirit. But yesterday, as I walked back from the barn, I saw this one lone leaf, it had just come off a tree and was falling so gracefully, and so slowly. It felt like it was Mister Mosely and I will accept it as such.

I buried him by The Lovey Hut which I spent all day in yesterday painting the walls. It is where I will have art and books, and animals for healing visits and art sales. Mister Mosely will grow sunflowers too. It dawned on me that Hughie, Huck/Muddy and now Mister Mosely form a triangle with their burial plots. I don't know what that signifies, but I felt it meant something to me to have noticed it.