It has taken me 4 weeks to gather the courage to write about the loss of my cat Macavity and yet I’m still in tears on the couch as I write this tribute to her.

It wasn’t a sudden loss. She died here at home of old age though I’m sure some kind of organ failure was involved.

It’s what she would have wanted and I know that must sound strange, but she was a very unusual cat.

I have known many wonderful cats, but she was a cat’s cat.

Everywhere I went, she was there. She demanded a great deal of my attention. Unlike many other cats, she had no secret life. She lived to spend time with me.

When I was doing whatever it is that I do, she’d be there.

I called her my shadow, my stalker. She sought me out and was always by my side but she was never cuddly. She was just always around.

She was not fond of other cats. She was the kind that preferred the company of people. If you got up from the dining room table at one of my dinner parties, she’d take your seat and look around as we all talked. It was not unusual for her to feel as though she fit in with all of us. If we all pointed and looked toward her ears sticking up above the table, she’d look annoyed.

I imagine is she could, she would have said: “What? Haven’t you ever seen a cat partake in after dinner conversation? Get over yourselves!”

She was a cat with a ton of attitude.

Her last day was spent partially outdoors in this old crate. I placed her in the sun that morning and Maurice slipped out quietly behind me. As I went back into the house to grab a book I turned around to check on her.

I saw this and my heart just fell to pieces as the tears poured out in buckets.

Maurice and Mona have adjusted to life without the Alpha cat, but I miss Macavity a lot.

Even if she will always be the cat who loved lawn…