Four Feet More

Things have been a bit out of sync over here lately. There has been a lot of the good mixed in with the bad, and it's left me a tad off-balance.

First of all, I've had a cold for the past week and a half, and I can't seem to shake it. Fortunately, it has not been accompanied by fevers and body aches, so I don't believe it is the dreaded swine flu. Thank goodness for that! I would like this stuffiness and coughing to go away now, though. After a particularly rough night, Jeff woke me this morning with a hug and a "Morning Jen. I hate you." Then he kissed my head, tucked the blankets around me, and got up. He was teasing, of course, but I did keep him up all night with my coughing. My poor, long-suffering husband. ;)

Things have also been a little different with my step-daughter, Ali. The good news is that she's contacting us a bit more regularly now, and she even came out for Eamon's birthday (it was the first time she's ever celebrated that with us). It was nice to see her and have her spend time with the family again. The bad news is that every time she contacts us, there seems to be a crisis of some sort. Often she needs money desperately, and sometimes there are other tragic events. First her boyfriend broke his back, and this week, a good friend of hers from high school died, along with 3 others, in a car crash on her way back from Vegas. Ali is naturally devastated, and I feel so bad for her because over the past few years, she seems to have separated herself from many of her support systems. It must be terribly hard to be living alone in a city away from family and close friends, especially during a such a difficult time. It is my hope that this horrible tragedy will have a silver lining, and Ali will examine the way her life is going and come to value family relationships once again.

The final blow for my week came yesterday, on Halloween. As you know, Rupert has not been doing so well. The tumor on his foot has been getting bigger, and he has been dropping weight. However, he was still acting like himself for the most part, and the foot didn't seem to be giving him any pain. Until yesterday. He had begun to get lethargic, but he still followed me around the house, purring when I said his name. However, as he walked through the kitchen, we noticed some blood on the floor. I immediately put his foot in warm water to clean it, and, well, I'll spare you all the gory details and just say that the tumor had broken though the skin and it was all-around unpleasant. Funny thing is, it still didn't seem to be causing Rupert any discomfort. He let me clean his foot without so much as a wince. But I knew that it wouldn't be long before the tumor would become infected and cause him great pain. So I took him into the vet, and she agreed that it was time to let him go. She also validated my decision not to amputate the foot, which made me feel a lot better because when faced with the decision of euthanasia, I began to question whether or not I could have done more for Rupert. In the end, he went peacefully, and Jeff, Vika and Eamon were there to give me hugs when I left the hospital in tears (they were not in the room with me - Jeff took the kids outside to pick flowers).

Fortunately, we had trick-or-treating to take the kids' minds off the loss of Rupert. It cheered me up too, to see Eamon running with his skinny little legs in his Obi-Wan Kenobi costume, and Vika preening around as an Asian Princess. Eamon usually wears baggier boy clothes, so to see him in a tight-fitting costume was a bit like seeing a fluffy cat that had just been doused with water. I don't know where that boy packs away all the food he eats! Both kids had a great time trick-or-treating and passing out candy at my mom's house (every time there was a knock on the door they jumped up and yelled, "Customers!!!"). They even scored some Baby Ruths, which naturally, I took as soon as they were in bed.


It was a fun end to a roller-coaster-week. But hopefully the coming days will be a bit more relaxed and I'll finally kick this cold. I also hope that where ever Rupert is, he's happily flinging around a milk top and surrounded by toilets with the lids up (his disgustingly favorite source of water). Goodbye little man. I'll miss you.