Remember 43 things about my beloved cat Max.

I have not written 43 things about you, but I think about you every day. You have been gone for a year, and every day, I miss your joyful furry self. Leo misses you too. The old gals will not play with him the way you did. I grieve for you more than I have grieved for many cats I have had and loved, and I think it is because your time here was so short. You should have lived to be an old, grumpy, arthritic cat, and I would have loved you just as much then. You lived the way we all should live, meeting each day with joy and living it with as much zest as you could muster. I love you and miss you, and even though I am retiring this goal with tears in my eyes, I will never forget you, dear Max.

took Max’s ashes and the ashes of a cat we had a good 20 years ago and scattered them in our woods. We said what we remembered most about each cat, told them we would miss them, and placed a rose where we had scattered each cat’s ashes.

Goodbye, sweet Max. Goodbye, dear L.A.

31. Max was an athletic cat, but sometimes he was very clumsy. He’s leap six feet through the air to land on the back of a sofa, then trip over the pillow. He was so funny.
32. Max spent his first few nights at our house sleeping behind the sofa in the sunroom. When we woke up, he would come out, yawning, and get some love.
33. Max jumpd down behind the refrigerator once and could not get back up to the counter. I lowered a towel down and he climbed it. Smart kitty!
34. Max loved toys and balls more than any cat I have ever seen. He played all the time.

26. Max got a litter pan in the house because he was a kitten, and he would not let go of it when he was older. When I tried putting it in the garage, he shat on Nick’s wheelchair cushion (fully washable, thank goodness). Max knew how to get what he wanted.
27. Every morning when I got up, all the kibble in the cats’ bowl was gone. I thought it was Leo, who came to us as a little starveling, but no. It was Max. :)
28. I could never blame Max for anything. He was too sweet.
29. Max loved all the other cats, but especially Molly. At first, she hissed and smacked him away, but he was persistent, and he won.
30. Max was very curious. One day, he must have gotten in my SUV as I was taking groceries out. I did not find him until the next morning. He had not peed or pooped in the SUV.

21. We found Max at an adoption fair in a local shopping center. I thought Nick was just going to hold a cat, but we cat lovers know how these things go. Max came home with us.
22. Max laid low the first few days with us, sleeping behind the sofa where I sleep and coming out only when we woke up. It was then that he started sleeping between Nick’s feet.
23.Max had a funny way of sitting on laps. Most cats tuck their feet under so that their bellies are somewhat raised. Max planted all that soft belly right on the lap he sat on.
24. Mac waited for me to get home every day. Like all cats, he was not obvious about it. He just “happened” to be on the table with a view of the door where I entered.
25. Max had spots on his belly, like a wild cat.

11. When Max was a kitten, his favorite thing was to race up behind out two older cats and leap over them.
12. Max had tufts of fur at the points of his ears.
13. Max chirped and yapped, but I don’t ever remember an actual meow.
14. Max purred easily.
15. After we got Leo, Max loved having a cat close to his age. Every morning, very early, they would wrestle and chase each other. Nick and I would laugh when we heard them.
16. Max preferred dry food to canned, and never had a bit of use for human food.
17. Max was not shy around people. He seemed to assume they would love him, and they did.
18. Max did not use the kitty scratching post we had, but he did appreciate the large, sofa and chair-shaped scratching posts scattered around our living areas.
19. Max loved to leap from the bed to the high chest of drawers and often did it right in front of me as I walked into the bedroom, knowing I’d stop at the chest of drawers and pet him. He loved attention.
20. The leap mentioned in number 19 was quite a distance. Max was an athletic cat.

1. Max used to sleep between Nick’s feet. He felt safe there.
2. Max always raced me to the bathroom in the morning so I would turn on water in the tub for him to drink.
3. Max would chirp when I came into a room where he was, and he’d tilt his head slightly upward in greeting, just like the hamster on the Kia Soul commercial.
4. Max had orange fur on his belly and on his butt.
5. Max was mainly a brown tabby. His eyes exactly matched his fur.
6. Max carried his tail high. He was a happy cat.
7. Anytime another cat got food, attention, or petting, Max was right there for his share.
8. Max would wait for Nick to be wheeled out into the living arae every morning. Then, as Nick got a treat from the drawer, Max would pace from the counter to Nick’s lap and back again until he got his treat.
9. Max loved to play. He had a favorite ball, soft and just the right size. He would carry it in his mouth. He looked so cute.
10. When Max first came to live with us, it was an amazingly easy transition. All the other cats liked him.