roxy lived in our bedroom. her entire existence for the last several years has been spent in our yard (or various wooded areas) and my bedroom. which is wildly weird, as i am completely allergic to her. this is my life.
and i am just so sad about the prospect of going into my bedroom and her not being there. when i should be at least a little happy that i no longer have to sleep with my bathroom window open. you see, once we adopted bruno - our 3rd and chippiest dog, roxy no longer had free roam of the house. our solution to this constant chaos was to put her in our room, close the door and open the bathroom window. it was supposed to be a short term solution, until bruno and roxy figured it out. they never did. so for the last 4 years or so, my bathroom window has been open - day and night, rain or shine, hot or cold. so the cat could come and go. we are the biggest suckers on the planet. but this was our reality.
over the years, we have had a couple of birds and lots of moles dragged thru that window. which is always pretty awful. most recently, roxy dragged a baby bunny up onto the roof, into the window and plopped down in the middle of our bedroom floor. SUPER gross. and always an adventure. probably one of my very favorite stories involves a BAT (yes, that kind) that ended up in the house - and the "bayer bat hunters" were born. we have had a ridiculous amount of craziness that has ensued because of that stupid open bathroom window. on a daily basis i would close the window for literally 10 minutes to shower, and roxy would invariably jump onto the sill and stare at me until i opened it. she hated when i closed the window.
the other really interesting thing about roxy is that she was mostly an outdoor cat. except she slept in our room every night. she loved our cushy comforter and needed attention as soon as we laid down. this is where my allergies got fun. its almost like she knew i couldnt pick her up or my face would explode. so she walked all over me. i used my blanket to pet her. and took an awful lot of benadryl. and counted on kris to rescue me when she absolutely needed a snuggle. we got in the habit of sending each other roxy pics. because if she was inside, she was with one of us. you couldnt lay down or shower or go to the bathroom without her. it was her little world and we were just living in it.the irony is i would say i am definitely a dog person. we rescued roxy from a bad storm 11 years ago - she was literally climbing up our screen door while we were eating dinner. we let her in, fed her, and she never left. we never intentionally set out to get a cat. it was more like she adopted us. and i guess i always felt that way. we were lucky that she chose us to hang out with. and she was part of our crazy mashed up 3 boys 3 dogs and a cat family configuration. a part of our story, as it were.
its funny the changes you make without even realizing it. kris kept cat treats in his car, because roxy liked to great you when you pulled up. we ended up with a litter box and a cat tree in our bathroom, along with the open window, when she started to spend more time inside. we knew she wasnt doing great. she got really skinny. she hung out more. but still, you always think you have more time. i really just wasnt prepared.
in the back of my mind, i always thought that one day i would be able to close my bathroom window. i guess i never really put too much thought into WHY that would be. and along with all of the other oh my god moments of our kids growing up, the passing of time hit me hard today. josh was FIVE when roxy decided to grace us with her presence. she has been here thru it all. a constant presence that greeted us when we got home, and cozied up for bedtime. and im going to miss her. she was unique. a truly once in a lifetime pet. i know that we will never have another cat. or a five year old that convinces us to keep one.time marches on. i know that this is a natural part of life. it doesnt make it any easier. and im pretty sure there are plenty of people out there who think she was just a pet. and she was. i understand that. but she was a part of my family. and somehow she has come to represent the end of that span of time that you blink and miss. how did 11 years pass so quickly? i can only hope she was happy she picked us. we were lucky she chose to pass the time with us, open window and all. rip rox
