After missing for almost a week, Mike found Loki’s remains out in the pasture near our house.
Loki was my short hair rescued black cat with green eyes who lived up to his namesake – Loki, the Norse God of Mischief.
And he really earned that name through various interactions with mom, my sister Ashlee and myself.
On one hand, I’m glad we found that much of him and I can work through the grieving process.
However, on the other, I’m swearing off rescuing or getting any more new pets.
We lost our Border Collie/Australian Shepherd mix to old age last summer and now losing Loki just hits a little too hard for me personally.
After all, Loki showed up under our carport in 2019 malnourished, skittish, crying, and pretty “spicy” according to my friends.
“Spicy” in this context refers to him having a lot of attitude – the Urban Dictionary definition, in case you’re wondering.
When he arrived, he was barely eight weeks old and I spent the first week bottle-feeding him with kitten formula before moving him to soft food and eventually kitten kibble.
Unfortunately, he had to be quarantined for those first six weeks due to a skin fungus that was spreadable to dogs and other cats.
But, once he was free to roam about the house he pretty much be
came my constant companion.
He tried to make friends with the older cats we have, but it didn’t pan out and that left it up to me to entertain him until work got in the way.
Then he was all about mischief – either stealing mom’s rubber bands or hiding them in the pet food bowls and chewing on the miniblinds in my bedroom.
With that, we also learned that he liked to clean up any peanuts Mike spilled around his desk or that landed on the couch cushions.
Loki hated wearing collars and always lost them, but would model any cat outfits that Ashlee brought home and had a preference for the black glitter bat wings she got him for Halloween.
Plus, he was the only cat I’ve ever known that liked to play fetch, chase the chickens in the yard, and that played with Penny the cocker spaniel, too.
And since the broken leg chronicles happened, he also spent most of his time at my side – even accompanying me to the bathroom and keeping me company.
Even then, he stayed most nights at my side either in bed or on the floor beside the bed.
To say that his loss has affected me is just barely scraping the surface of how much I loved that cat.
While most of my memories of Loki exist in private, there’s still plenty of proof on social media between photos and a few choice video clips.
I’m going to take solace in what I have and spread the love to our remaining pets in the meantime.
After all, I can tell Penny misses Loki because they used to play together every morning and now he’s gone.
That leaves playtime up to me in the morning and I’m trying to find the best way to handle that without getting her so excited that she piddles on the floor.
