How Magic Found Me, And What I Did With It When I Had Gotten It Was Drunk
This is not the same story as How I Became A Pagan In The Third Grade. I'm saving that one for a hot Summer day. The year I turned 16, I had a friend who got into witchcraft. I had long since stepped into the role of "the good friend who pulls you out of the trouble you've gotten yourself into"
In that past year I had left home in the dark of night to keep a friend from trying LSD, sat with a suicider, ended several fights and "checked out" countless spiked drinks, and usually the crappy boyfriends who spiked the drink in the first place. I didn't think I was invincible, I just thought I was better armed than my pals. Then my friend brought home a Penji board. That would be an ouija board with a pendulum instead of a planchette.
So I'm sitting at her house, watching her swing this little glass pointer over the pretty piece of cardboard, wondering at how people can believe in this kind of thing. After all, why should anything in the universe give a shit that you bought a mystical doodad to try to contact someone who died before you were born. When I die, I plan on getting an unlisted number.
Anyway, I'm thinking these things, secretly hoping the pointer will do something really cool when I see something zap from the board, up the pendulum to Sue's hand. I felt it like a burst of adrenaline shooting up my spine. She drops the pendulum super-fast, and we both stare at it for a second. Then we talked ourselves down. The standard, "did you see that? Yeah, and I felt it too." which ends in, "We probably made it up."
That night creepy things happened in her house. The next day, I put on my saviour (as in save-your-ass) hat, and went to check out her previously average house. Mind you, I had done nothing particularly magical up to that point, unless you count esp type stuff, which I didn't. It didn't occur to me that maybe I don't know what I'm doing. It occurred to me that I had better know what I'm doing, because she needs help. I went all around her house feeling hot spots and cold spots and creepy spots that make your scalp tingle, then told her it was HER house, so she should just tell the thing to leave. That didn't work so well. She spent the night at my house instead. The next night I stayed at her house, figuring she's never going to get out of my house unless I can convince her that her place is safe.
That night I woke up and I couldn't move. I felt like someone else had control of my body, and was fighting to take over my mind. I had seen enough movies about possession to really freak out. I started trying to pray. When in doubt, return to your Catholic roots! "Hail Mary full of...shit! Our father who art in...damnit!" I couldn't remember a frigging thing. I just kept repeating "Our father who art in heaven" over and over in my head. Mentally struggling to push this thing out and get control of my body so I could kick Sue as hard as possible, Then get us both back to my house. Suddenly I felt a thing like cool water run through my head, then through the rest of me, and suddenly, I was free!
(did I make it all up? probably)
We spent the next few nights at my house while I bounced what had happened off anyone who would listen. Then I went back to Sue's place and told the whatever to GET OUT! I washed the door frames with holy water, and put my hands on every wall, tracing any sensation I could find, sweeping everything before me in a massive wave of my own thoughts, shoo-ing all towards the front door. Then I blessed the door.
The end result? Sue bitches at me because the ghost of her Grandmother left too.
That one week of fun and games pointed me toward a path of witchcraft. My goal was to learn everything I could, as quickly as I could, so I could rescue my friends with minimal effort. I learned astral projection so I could rescue people without getting out of bed.

How I learned to Astral Project
When I was a wee newbie, starry eyed with possibility and quaking in fear of turning evil, I met a lot of people who said they knew more about magic than I was ever likely to learn. Practically every girl I knew was invited to join at least one coven. I was always passed over, or just plain ignored. For a while I was one very bitter 16 yr. old, and then I got stubborn. I would place myself in a room with a pal and her latest "teacher" and just listen. I firmly believed that if someone could do something, then I could do it too. It was like, " YOU can do a thing? Well, peh! It should be a no-brainer for me, then." Arrogant little snot, wasn't I?
The thing was, I could do whatever the teacher was trying to teach my pal. Usually on the first attempt.
The one task I had trouble with was astral travel. The whole bit about laying down in bed and relaxing every muscle in your body, starting with your pinky toe and working your way s l o w l y up your body. Relaxing millimeter by millimeter, then finally lifting yourself out, just so you can turn around and look at your body laying there? That meditation only served to make me incredibly aware of my physical being. It didn't do a thing to inspire trust that my body would be o.k. when I got back. How about this one? You're sitting in a field staring at the clouds. One of them is supposed to come down to you, then you climb on it and it lifts you away. My cloud always looked like a hippo. It would hang up in the sky, grinning it's goofy cartoon grin. Taunting me to come for a ride. To where? Africa?
Sue had a teacher named Steve. Steve wanted to get in Sue's pants. When Steve decided to teach Sue a meditation for astral projection, I asked if I could stay in the room. He replied, "I guess, but I don't know why you bother, you can't learn anything from it."
Them's fightin' words, buddy! I resolved to not only astral project, but to project myself all the way to his house, and rip down all his shields. (which I did, nyah.)
Steve walked her through the "stars" meditation, listed below this story. Low and behold, it worked! I felt those stars calling my soul, and I went to join them. In the midst of this travel, Steve suggested that someone who had died would come to guide us. I went sideways to a fringe of trees, then a grassy meadow. My Grandfather met me there. He told me that what I was doing was a good thing. Then he walked away to the other end of the field. At the edge if the meadow, a glowing man stepped out, and guided my Grandfather back to wherever he had been.
My Grandpa died when I was 5. I remember the phone ringing, and I knew Grandpa was dead. My mom stood by the phone. She didn't want to answer it. I thought, "it's ok, he's dead, mom. It's ok." And she sighed, and picked up the phone. My great Grandma died when I was 9. I knew that too. I woke up early, and I could see her thoughts. She was re-living her past, and then she thought, "It was good. Then she let go and died.
I had sort of expected my great Grandma to be the deceased family member to guide me, since I had 4 more years with her, but it was Grandpa who came to tell me I was on the right path.
Thanks, Grandpa. I love you.

At the suggestion of a very good friend I'm sharing this astral projection meditation.
All my meditations start with this suggestion- get comfy
so... get comfy. Picture the stars above you. Watch them for a while, see how they twinkle and dance. Listen to their song. The song of the stars calls to your soul. Their call pulls you out to join them.

Now that you're out of your body, where would you like to go today?

Kudos to Steve, from ages ago. Dude, If you hadn't wanted to get into Sue's pants so badly, you never would have taught her that meditation, and I wouldn't have learned it. I tip my hat to you.

I'd like to thank my friends for putting up with my occasional rants. I know they're negative, and down on myself, and about things I should have just accepted a long time ago. Sometimes it's fun to roll around in your personal pile of trash. It's like visiting an old friend. It's comfortable, and when you climb out and brush yourself off, the world looks so beautiful!

I did a google search to see if my other blog shows up, and I started wondering about the peculiarities of the redhead condition. I should have wondered about this a month ago, when I started noticing a profundity of redheads out there. The kind who's color comes from a bottle. That peculiar shade of artificial copper-burgundy that never occurs in nature. (sigh) Red hair is in again. This means I'll run into lots of people asking me where I got my hair done, because they just have to have that color!
This rant does not apply to people who have the good taste to get red highlights. This rant only applies to people with tan skin, black eyebrows and (gods damn them) visible eyelashes. I would have given up all the notoriety I received as a kid just to have dark eyelashes... or the ability to tan. I'm an 80's child. Everyone I knew "laid out" to get a tan. I "laid out" to get pink and freckly. Everyone used baby oil, I used baby sunblock. By the end of summer I had usually achieved a nice warm gold color.
Another redhead rant- Who the hell makes up the colors for foundation? Why is an ivory dress ivory but "ivory" foundation is pink? Needless to say, I don't wear foundation. I do, however, wear brown mascara. Ha, ha ha, ha ha! I have triumphed over nature! I have eyelashes now! And as soon as my b-day comes around, I'll triumph again. I'm buying myself a HAIR STRAIGHTENER. Coarse, frizzy, poofy hair has it's place. Sometimes. Now, thanks to solid ceramic ionizing hair straighteners, I too can achieve straight hair!
Yes, I have hair issues.

What the ...? A tip of the hat to AlterNet.org for this Bush Administration 'oops of the day'

Dangers of blinkered vision
The Washington Post reports, "Bush administration officials say they underestimated the Shiites' organizational strength and are unprepared to prevent the rise of an anti-American, Islamic fundamentalist government in the country." A State Department official told the Post, "I don't think anyone took a step backward and asked, 'What are we looking for?' The focus was on the overthrow of Saddam Hussein."
April 23, 2003 @ 5:41PM

Amusement of the day: Go to PBS's Frontline and see Which media conglomerate own what. Then spend some quality time with your television (heh). Pick a channel owned by any company on the list, and watch it for an hour. Count how many times in that hour you see adverts for, or references to products this company owns, as versus ads for products not related to anything the company owns.
As an example: Viacom has a pretty good reputation. They own great things like Nickelodeon, MTV, VH1, and Comedy Central. I chose them because they're the second largest media group worldwide, but they don't seem to be in the active business of mongering death. (unlike, say AOL Time Warner who owns both CNN and most of the truly profitable rap record labels)
Even on a Viacom owned channel I'll bet you'll see more ads for Paramount pictures, toys with a Nickelodeon logo, Paramount theme parks, and TV land, than for anything else.

Easter Eggs and 12 Year-Olds
My son is 12, which makes him too cool to hunt for easter eggs. He's also too cool to dye eggs, but he did it with his Grandma (and enjoyed it like crazy) Anyway, he spent the weekend with Grandma and I spent the weekend revisiting my past on my randomredhead blog. This reminded me of the plastic eggs full of quarters my sister and I would hunt for on Easter. Those quarters went immediately into the greedy slots of video games. Josie rocked at Pac-Man, I could usually make it to the apple stage.
This year, I dumped the contents of the change jar into some eggs and added a clue to each one. When L got home, he found a note in his easter basket sending him to "the Guru" for his first clue. Buck is the guru. I watched him dashing through the house, from under his pillow, to the new movies we had bought, back to his room to find his Kingdom Hearts game, etc. His face was all lit up in a smile, his eyes sparkled, he glowed! He was so disappointed when he reached the end. He opened the 4 eggs I had left over, trying to find another note. I heard him saying, "Dollar... dollar...dollar...this one has to have the note... dollar.(sigh)"
Next year, I'll buy more eggs.

Y'know, I put on the side of my blog "paganism, shamanism, fine arts and rockhounding". Look. <----It's right there.
Have I raved about any of these things? noooo. heh.
So...
Here's a nice little meditation for finding a power animal.
Get into a comfy meditative space. (I meditate sitting, laying, doing chores, working out, anywhere really, as long as no one's touching me) Take some deep breaths, breathe in the essence if who you are. Smell the faint aroma of your shampoo, your fabric softener, your own personal scent rising delicately off your body. Picture yourself standing in a field. Look ahead and see some trees. Walk toward the trees and enter a forest. There is a path before you. Walk the path. Smell the green smell of the woods. Hear the sound of your footsteps. The rustling sigh of the wind, the snap of a twig, small noises of the living forest around you.
Look around as you walk. There's a squirrel climbing a tree. There's a pebble on the path. Walk through the forest. There's running water nearby. You come to a bridge. It crosses a river. Leave anything you have brought with you at the bridge. Pick it up on your way back, or throw it into the river, if spirit moves you.
Cross the bridge and enter the woods on the other side. It's sunnier here. The woods are not as dense.
The forest opens to a clearing. In the clearing are some huge boulders. Walk to the other side of the boulders and you will find your power animal behind one.
Meet your power animal. Cherish the strengths and weaknesses it brings to you. Hang out talking, ask it to come home with you, leave it for another day, whatever feels right. You'll know.
When you are ready, go back the way you came. (then get on the internet and read everything you can about your new friend ;))

I was posting to my other blog and I thought, "Geez, this shit's depressing! Maybe I should submit it to the Lifetime Channel instead of turning it into a book."

On another note- I was grocery shopping tonight and I had to get kitty litter. This took me past the shelves stuffed with cat toys. As usual, I looked at all of them. Purrhaps today I would find the fabled holy grail of cat toys, Yellow Kitty would like that...oh.
I'm proud to say I did not cry in the store, I just thought about it. I guess I'm getting old. I don't remember carrying my grief this long for any of my other cats, but it's been a long time since I've had any other cats leave my life.

When did free speech become a potential act of treason? Visit The Daily Traitor to find out. I re-emphasize that I will not put my energy behind anything that supports the kind of torture the people of Iraq have been experiencing for generations...AND we must speak out against the acts of repression in our own country, or else we will surely lose the right.
It is our patriotic obligation to take responsibility for the actions of our country. Our patriotism fails when we roll over and accept the unacceptable. If you have an opinion, voice it! Whatever it may be.

I am in favor of lifting up your fellow human being. I am against violence.
I am in favor of life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness and selfish acts of kindness. I am against persecution.
I am in favor of purchasing another county's goods. I am against the theft of any person's goods.
I am in favor of your right to stand outside an abortion clinic with a sign. I am against righteousness.

Violence, persecution, righteousness, theft...these things weigh us down. Right action lifts us up.

Have you sent in you taxes yet? There's still time to blow through them, struggling against your shoddy mathematical skills, wishing like crazy you'd BOUGHT A DAMN CALCULATOR! You even have time for dinner before you join the loser parade downtown. The post office will be taking your mail 'til midnight, but if you get there around 10 you have a shot of being on the local news. :)

If this had you feel loserly, don't worry. One year I actually joined that line just to mail a letter. What a smoggy experience. I highly recommend it!

I miss Yellow Kitty. His full name is Mine Little Yellow Kitty Cat. His life began on a farm. When he was 3 months old, a family brought him to the city to live with their 2 big dogs and their small boy. Kitty didn't like the dogs. They were big and noisy, and he was very afraid. He clawed through the insulation next to their air conditioning unit, squeezed through a 4 inch gap, and found that freedom is a very hungry place. He found us after 3 days of wandering without food or water. He came up to us -skinny, dry and lonely and climbed right up into L's lap! We were living with my Mom at the time, and she didn't want to have any more cats in the house, so we snuck him water and food. He hid under the lilac tree and greeted us every morning. He seemed more interested in loving than eating, and every time we went inside he followed us to the door. One day he just came inside with us. My Mom decided he could stay, which is good- 'cause we were keeping him anyway :p
Several days later L was showing off his new cat, and the boy down the street said, "That's my cat!" L went to give him back, and the boy's mom told us how he had escaped and told us to keep him. "He's obviously happier with you," She said. Thus we got a puffy scruffy kitty cat, and the dogs got a cat-free house back.
Since he was used to being outdoors, we let him travel about at night, until he came home with a hole in his head. Some little bastard had shot him with a bb gun. It went right through his temple into his ear canal. I was mad enought to spit nails. What kind of person shoots a cat? What kind of person lets their kid grow up thinking it's ok to shoot people's pets? (yeah, and what kind of idiot lets their pet out to be shot?...this kind, apparently)
We took Kitty to the vet and got antibiotics for him. The hole healed up, and even grew fur again. We neutered him to curb his need to wander, and he became a total indoor cat. He learned some of our language. Food? meant if you want something to eat go sit by your bowl. Treats? meant if you want cat treats, perk up, meow and stare at my hand. He would come when you called. He would find you if he thought you were lost. He would hop up and butt heads with you to say "hi". He was smart and funny and snuggly. He never bit or clawed. When we moved to our new home, he lost all the fur around his butt and tail. He would look great walking toward you, then he'd walk away and there's this denuded backside staring you in the face. It never failed to make me laugh.

I typed something wrong, can't get to the link. The site is superhero designs journal And here is what she had to say...
Hitting

Yesterday, while I rode the BART train downtown, a woman tried to get her 2-year- old to sit in his stroller. He was crying and wriggling around and the woman was getting more and more incensed, shoving him into the stroller, whacking him on the legs, picking him up, hurling him back into the seat again, hitting him on the back, hard, over and over again...

We all watched this scene frozen in our seats, eyes wide, shocked, not knowing what to say.

Finally, a man walked slowly up the aisle, kneeled down beside her, and said calmly, “I know this is a frustrating situation for you, but you can’t hit him.”

She began to cry then, and stuttered through an explanation about how the child was hitting her and he won’t get in his seat, etc.

The man repeated, very gently and very matter of factly, “I understand this is frustrating for you, and you can’t hit him.”

She stopped. The baby stopped crying. And then she got off the train.

Through the hot tears that poured down my face as I left, I felt so grateful for this man for teaching me something so important, so fundamental and beautiful about how to serve... I didn’t know what to say, if it was my “place” to say anything, if this woman would get even more angry if I did. And so I was silent.

It made me think of all of the places in my life where I’m not saying anything, and maybe I should be. It made me think of the war, and how we are watching this violence, sometimes like silent bystanders, amazed and horrifed that it’s even happening.

It made me think that someone needs to kneel beside our world leaders and say,
“Hey. I know this is a frustrating situation, but you can’t hit them.”

Yellow Kitty came into our lives on a sunny July morning. He left us on the same day we took Baghdad. That Wednesday morning, after taking L to school, I opened a can of wet cat food to feed Kitty, and he wouldn't eat it. He looked at it for a while, then walked away from the dish. I gave the food to Loki, instead. Loki really enjoyed it! I went looking for Kitty to take him for his last dose of sub-q's and kidney test, and I couldn't find him. I called and called and he didn't even give a "here I am" meow. I finally found him wadded up in a ball behind L's door, facing into the corner. I've seen this kind of behavior in cats before, and I knew what it meant. I called to reschedule his appt. for later in the day, so L could say goodbye to him after school.
Then I retrieved Kitty from behind the door. When I picked him up, he started making this awful "I'm in pain, you're hurting me" sound. I wrapped him in a towel, carried him into the living room and put him on my lap. He just laid there on me as I held his head and petted him. His fur was hot like he had been lying in the sun. He was still making "I hurt" noises, so I tapped into his energy and took the pain and fever away. When his body cooled down he slid off me and went back to behind the door.
I told L that this was Kitty's last day when I picked him up from school, and he cried some, then he visited with Kitty and cried some more, then like any normal 12 yr. old boy, he went outside to play for a while. When it came time for Hubby and I to leave, L asked me to tell Yellow Kitty that he would miss him. It was the last words we said to him.

When I was a kid, we had to put a pet down. We took the cat to the vet, said our good bye's and left him there. Not so this time. We didn't want him to die alone on a table, so we stayed with him through it.
The vet, who I highly recommend by the way, gave him a sedative shot in the butt, which seemed to hurt like hell. Kitty meowed and hissed and bit at my sleeve, then the sedative kicked in and he totally relaxed. He laid there with his eyes open, and we watched his pupils dilate and contract, dilate and contract. We joked that he was tripping, and we hoped it was a good one. We petted him the whole time the sedative was taking full affect. After a while, the vet returned and gave him a second shot. A few seconds passed by, and the vet said "Alright. He's gone. You can stay as long as you like." Hubby and I cried, stroked Kitty's body, cried some more, got ourselves under control, cried some more, etc. I did not feel Kitty go. I felt him still there not breathing, and then I spent some time crying and trying to breathe around the tight lump in the back of my throat, and when I looked again it was just a furry body. My eyes panned from Kitty to the wall, to my Hubby to the other wall, and I saw little twinkly gnat-snowflakes fluttering behind me and Hubby. In typical me-fashion, I thought, "Kitty hasn't been dead long enough to draw bugs, why are there gnats by Buck's head?" I looked all around watching the twinklies flutter between us and the wall, and said "Do YOU see the twinklies?" He said, in a kind of sad voice, "No, I don't see them." When the twinklies went away all at once, we left the body and paid our $55 bill and went home. On the way home, I suggested that perhaps what I saw was because I had rubbed my eyes before seeing the Kitty snowflakes. My wonderful husband said "I prefer to think it was Yellow Kitty." And he meant it!
I DID rub my eyes. Petting the cat and then wiping tears made my allergies flare up, and my eyes itched. So I put a kleenex to my eyes and rubbed a bit. I took the kleenex down, looked at it, looked at Kitty, looked at the wall, looked at Buck, THEN saw the sparkles along side of us, but not between us or overlaying Buck's face. I like to think it was Yellow Kitty too. I am honored that he chose to share his life with us. He was a fabulous cat.

Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible, thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions and comfortable habit. Thought looks into the pit of hell and is not afraid. Thought is great and swift and free, the light of the world, the chief glory of man.

- Bertrand Russell

This morning, as I was waiting for Yellow Kitty to get his second subcutaneous fluids injection, I saw a middle aged woman come out of the admissions door. She gave a "that's that" kind of sigh, and I glanced at her as she swung an empty cat carrier onto one of the chairs. It was like I suddenly had a camera in my head.
-click- she's crying
-click- cat carrier
-click- little pile of poo in the carrier, no cat
"I can't walk out of the vet with an empty cat carrier, maybe they admitted her, no, you know she's been put to sleep, I'll wrap Yellow Kitty in a towel not the carrier" flashes through my head, then -tak!- the carrier comes to rest on the chair, and I start to quietly cry. So I'm sniffing, and she's sniffing, and I won't look at her. And I think if she sees me, she'll think I'm crying over my cat. I was crying over my cat, but I thought I was crying over her grief, which I could feel. She was being "good" and "tough" and I was right there with her in that moment.
She paid her bill, and the girl behind the counter asked her if she wanted the ashes returned, and she said "no."
I looked at Kitty, and tried to think of where we would scatter his ashes, but I couldn't think of anywhere. I decided Leo would decide.

It's funny how grief takes you.

http://xilerui.blogspot.com/ gave credit, but no link to Chriswife... for this fun questionaire, which I have lifted for my own nefarious purposes. heh heh heh

A - Act your age? I have a hard time remembering my age.
B - Born on what day of the week? Wednesday
C - Chore you hate? d i s h e s ...bleh...
D - Dad's name? William Daniel Phillips Jr. although he's living under an assumed name right now.
E - Essential makeup item? soap? I guess mascara is an essential for when I bother to put on makeup.
F - Favorite actor? that's a toughie. Today I'd say Gary Oldman. Didja see him in Dracula? How about in The Fifth Element? It's a toss up between him and Andreas Katsulas, both are damn good actors with range AND class
G - Gold or silver? Gold, definately
H - Hometown? duh St. Louis
I - Instruments you play? pennywhistle and hand drum
J - Job title? MOM, however, on paper I have to put doofy things like home maker or domestic engineer
K - Kids? yes
L - Living arrangements? I live in a house, how about you?
M - Mom's name? Gracie
N - Number of people you've slept with? slept? you can SLEEP in a bed? I've had sex with enough people to know I like having sex with my hubby
O - Overnight hospital stays? only after babies pop out of me
P - Phobia? spideys (hi, fate!) heights (actually falling from them) and, freakishly enough, I'm claustrophobic, dammit
Q - Quote you like? "life is a playground" - Richard Bach
R - Religious affiliation? pagan
S - Siblings?just one sister.
T - Time you wake up? depends on the day
U - Unique habit? 3-D doodles with anything clay-like
V - Vegetable you refuse to eat? jalapeno pepper
W - Worst habit? Procrastination, hands down.
X - X-rays you've had? ankles, teeth, lungs, knees, back. All told about 20 occasions to be exposed to cancer causing/killing rays from a box.
Y - Yummy food you make? everything but bread, and I'm working on that
Z - Zodiac Sign? Taurus, Gemini rising

kitty's test numbers: one in the 90's that should have been 10 or so and his creatine (?) score was 7 when it should have been 1
There's this optomistic hope that the kidney flush will fix everything. I hope he got stressed, got dehydrated, couldn't get better because of the stress...
Oddly enough, Roomie had the same thing, Although she caught the Cruise Ship Virus, not Chronic Renal Failure.
It's the circle of life, people, and it moves us all toward an IV drip

Yellow Kitty is in kidney failure. It can come on very suddenly, which it did. It's most common in persians, and with Kitty's long hair, I'm sure he has a bit of persian blood in him. He only weighs 7 lbs now, which means he's lost 30 percent of his body weight. (sigh) He's being pretty lethargic, doesn't move around too much. He seems to be eating ok, and Hubby put his water cup on the floor so Kitty could drink out of it whenever he wants. Kitty has always liked drinking from that cup. He will follow it around waiting for an opportunity to stealthily sneak up and drink from it, then go skittering off into another room when he gets caught, tail in the air, fur puffed out everywhere. It's pretty damned comical!
We are going to take him to the vet every day for the next 3 days, and they're going to give him subcutaneous fluids to help flush his kidneys. After the 3 day treatment, we'll do another blood test and see if it helped. Then we'll discuss it with our son. Then we'll make a really hard decision. I wish it were more clear cut. An inoperable brain tumor = happy pouncing ground. Chronic Renal Failure = ?
He's meowing right now. I wish I knew his language. Does he hurt? Is he afraid? Blogging is not helping here.

Gods! The more I read about treatment for this, the more it breaks my heart. I've always been of the mindset "screw your own needs, think of your pet's needs" We could apparently go months poking a needle into our cat's back and giving him a camel hump of fluid. We could keep doing this, saving his kidneys, easing or relieving the pain of kidney failure until all those excess fluids accumulate around his heart or in his lungs and he dies that way.
There's a website where a cat lived FOUR YEARS after diagnosis. Her cat, Whiskers, was 17 years old when it was diagnosed.
We've only had Yellow Kitty for 9 years. Will I risk heart disease to keep him around another few years? Can I somehow justify killing him because it would be easier to move on than to care for him? Cats don't understand that tomorrow might be a good day. Cats live in the now. Does holding him down, poking him with a needle ever other day and confining his movements while the scruff of his neck fills with prescription water constitute torture? Or, since cats live in the now, will it become "now it's a bother" then "now there's a moth in the house" etc.?
I don't see which path I should take here. I hate it when I can't see a clear road.

Thanks for listening, whoever's out there reading this.

would you believe there's a website on feline health called
tumor tidbits? Kitty may have a central nervous system tumor or (more likely) kidney disease.

In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity - Albert Einstein.

Worrying about WHAT'S right, is always more important that worrying about WHO'S right - unknown.

Women and cats will do as they please and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea. Robert A. Heinlein

My cat is dying, my roomie can't hold down food, my friend is being stalked by her sperm donor and my tummy wiggles like a full motion water bed.

Here's what's really going on = A has been throwing up since last Monday, and her doctor just now got her a bed at Saint Anthony's Hospital So we can assume they're pumping her full of fluids and vitamins and such, and hopefully by now the lab tests are back with good news!
The sperm donor only came by once, so he's not really stalking.
The cat has had blood drawn and fluids replaced 'cause he's a tad dehydrated, and I'll know tomorrow what might be wrong with him.
AND my belly/waterbed is fun to play with.

In the immortal words of Homer Simpson... WooHoo! Look at that blubber fly!