My Friend

27th April Wednesday

This afternoon I put the pussy cat in his basket and drive out on the A38 to visit an animal healer. There is an accident between a car and a motorbike. We sit in a long queue of traffic, the sun pouring in through the windscreen. I worry he’ll get dehydrated. He’s eating and drinking so little at the moment. The roads are lined with hawthorn ( or blackthorn) bushes in full dense flower - starry bridal white. The hedgerows are frothy with cow parsley. As if the countryside is celebrating its own royal wedding.

We are only a few minutes late. The animal healer is a young woman with such a warm and gentle nature I want to cry with relief - someone to help our pussy cat who won’t make him spit and claw out. She calls him Friend and if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes I wouldn’t have believed it - he stays on her lap for nearly half an hour while she holds and stokes him. He won’t sit on my lap for more than a few minutes and won’t ever be cuddled. He stretches out and lets her touch him even on his stomach. He’s not asleep just totally relaxed.

While I watch I feel as if her hands are soothing my heart too. She says when I start to feel better so will the pussy cat. She suggests I have a salt bath at home and the pussy cat will eat when he’s ready and he may go roaming tonight. I make an appointment for us to go back. I’m so grateful to our Friend who has walked his path with us for fourteen years - maybe even carrying my burdens. And now it’s time for us to put them down - him and me.