There will never be a moment where I am not grateful for every second that I got to be yours. Every animal, just like every person, is an unique experience that every now and then, we are lucky enough to know.
Your space in my heart will always be just that: yours. And I am so glad for that. Every moment since you left has been impossibly hard, but I wouldn't change a thing- to know you was worth every bit of this grief.
There is no great grief without great love, and you gave me every bit of the love I gave back, and then some. I know that, no matter what experiences I continue to have, or come to know, I cannot imagine being loved as much by another as I was by you.
You were found on a muddy, desolate job site, and right off the bat, you were strange and unusual. With your smushed up face, tiny proportions, and big, gecko-like eyes, it surprised no one that we came to joke about you being an alien piloting a cat's body.
When my brother's sought to catch your tiny, hungry little self, you peed all over one of them out of fear, and spite, and probably a few other things. They brought you home to me.
It took four months to earn your trust. I would lay beside your playpen and talk to you, offering a hand. And when you finally leaned into it, it was as if we had never been anything but absolutely smitten for each other.
You loved me simply for me. Didn't need anything else. Every night, you came to curl up with me- the ritual of hugs, and kisses, and headbutts. When I worked on art, you would climb into my lap, and lean back to get kisses every now and then.
You never really loved someone as much as you loved me. We do not know what happened to you in your first months of life, but we know that humanity was scary- it took years for you to allow anyone but myself near, and even then, you had conditions. It was only in your last couple years that you found your true comfort, that you gave anyone else a headbutt.
My best friend, Britt, nearly cried when you let them pet you for the first time. You were so, so special.
We got you a pineapple bed at one point, and you loved it! But ONLY it. So much so, that when it got ratty, I had to find another exactly like it as you rejected every other option I tried. So your pineapple would prevail, sitting under my work desk where you slept while I worked. Sometimes, I would sing to you about your silly little home.
Who lives in a pineapple under my desk? Grem Grem, Grem Grem! Tiny and bizarre, simply the best! Grem Grem, Grem Grem!
I will always think of you when I see pineapples. What a silly, silly thing that I am so glad to carry.
You let me know it was time. It was a long time coming, but you made the choice. You fought so hard, and we did everything we could to beat it- but cancer makes exceptions for no one. But you let me know it was time, and it was okay, when you climbed up on my bed to snuggle on the 14th. You leaned your little head back for kisses, and I knew.
We went in the next day. I held you. Even as you fell asleep, you purred. The weight of your loss is so heavy, it feels like the entire world has fallen to pieces around me in so many ways.. but I am so glad to know it, to have been loved so stringlessly by such a strange, darling creature.
I hope you have another life, and it's everything you could ever want. I hope that, if we do cycle this strange world, that perhaps, just perhaps, you might find your way back to me in whatever form you take. But for now, I will carry you, and everything you taught me in my heart, may it guide me well- you always did.
You taught me how to love wholly, and well, and I wouldn't be the person I am today if not for your tiny, squishy face. I am so glad you will not endure any further pain, and that I could choose to carry it with me instead. I hope there are so many feathery toys where you've gone, and that one day you get to give me butterfly kisses again.
Love you Gremlin, Grem Grem, Gremble, Gremble Gramble, Grem Cracker, my little Groom Groom, forever and always- and then some. Thank you for being mine, know that I will always be yours.
