Isabelle

 My wife and I were never able to have children, we tried and tried, and also understood that our odds were against us while she battled PCOS (Polycystic Ovary Syndrome), and I would later find out that there may have been reasons why I couldn't procreate as well. We are a great combination in everything else, but for procreation purposes it was never mean't to be. During the recession, I guess we could have explored adoption options or any medical procedures to better our chances to have children, but we had a lot of financial issues which eventually led to a bankruptcy.

As we got older, we realized if it was mean't to be, God would make that happen for us. It was God that led us to one another, and it was God that led Becky to Isabelle.

Isabelle was our daughter, and although she was not our human daughter, our little petite Bombay feline was our daughter none the less. Our whole world evolved around her, and she knew it. We spoiled her, and although she was not a needy cat, she did love attention and she really enjoyed it when all three of us were together. She was in our lives for quite some time. To put it in perspective on how long Izzy has been with us, she was in my wife Becky's life before I even was. Becky and I, will be celebrating our 14th Wedding Anniversary this October.

Bombays are for people that prefer dogs, that may be thinking of having a cat. They are dog-like in many aspects compared to most cats. Isabelle knew when we were going through some emotional situations and she would cater to our needs. She also played fetch, in which she would retrieve the ball, hair-tie, bread twisty, and even rolled-up socks in the same manner as an obedient dog. She was very vocal in letting us know what she wanted, and definitely knew the art of persuasion and when to beg. 

Isabelle had her routines. She was always at the door to greet her mom when she got home, in which she wanted Becky's shoulder. I would get home she would greet me at the door, walk away and go straight for the bathroom, where she would meet me at the bathroom sink for what Becky called 'Wet Pets', in which Isabelle would drink from the faucet that had a light stream constantly going, and I would pet her in which she would purr away. 

I would proceed to go take my shower, and once I was done she would then go to the now vacant bathtub in which Isabelle would play in the leftover water in the tub, drinking the water or while cleaning herself. We used to have a water bowl next to the sink, and when I would get ready for work (using the sink to shave), she would mimic me somewhat dipping her paw in the water while wiping her paw to her face. Becky would come in every time, "Our you having face time with Daddy?" 

After my morning showers after work, I would proceed to the kitchen to have a bowl of cereal, sit on the sofa, while watching the morning news. She would lay against my side, and sometimes impatiently would be demanding my cereal milk before I was done with it. Patience was definitely not one of her skill sets. Depending on the cereal she would drink it the milk, other times she would sniff it and then roll her nose while walking away as if I just publicly offended her or something.

To not confuse my readers, I work overnights, which means once I get off work between 6 a.m. to 6:30 a.m., I would head home, and then would go to bed usually between 8 am to 9 am, while sleeping until 3:30 to 4:30 or whatever. 

Some mornings after a shower and breakfast, sometimes while having breakfast, I would work on some APBA Baseball stats, blogging or some other database stuff. I would do this computer work until Isabelle would start crying for me to go to bed, because that's what she did with us, she called the shots or liked to think that she did. And from time to time, she would continue to do so, and I would be like "Give me 10 minutes" and she would walk away. The worst (or at least the worst for her) was when she gave up, and would already be curled up at the foot of my side of the bed, and I would come in set the white noise sound machine (I do night sounds) while slipping off my slippers -- all while Isabelle would be peaking with this look like "Are you seriously going to disrupt my sleep?" 

She would get up while I was getting comfortable in the bed, she would go to the box or snack on some cat food, and then she would come back to bed, in which was our go-to-sleep routine, she would eventually settle on my left hip. She slept on me, because her mom is the wiggle-worm. Isabelle slept on Becky if Becky was laying on her back. All three of us would have cuddle sessions in which Isabelle would lay on Becky while we both pet Isabelle while we just talked about everything under the sun. Isabelle really loved times like these, I wished that we did it more like the old days, at the end of her life.

Isabelle also hated it when Daddy left for work, she has at times laid across my work shoes or work jacket in an attempt to either stop me from going to work, or had her thinking that she could come with me. Sometimes while I am gathering up my things to head off for work, she would suddenly get in a playful mood, running around the apartment all bat-shit crazy "You don't want to go to work daddy, you want to stay here and play". As if it was that easy.

Sometimes I left for work, only to find a text message five minutes later from Becky "Someone's crying."

Sometimes she would lay on the ground, and do the cute roll-over beg, in which she is also saying 'please don't go' or 'I want something'. She did that when she wanted wet food, which she always had at almost 8 am on the dot, sometimes earlier, sometimes a bit later.... but most often then not, eight on the dot, which made us think she actually could read time. Daylights savings sometimes threw her off, but she usually adjusted pretty good to that.

She didn't interrupt my APBA games in the Kitty-delay matter that many cats have done to some of my other fellow APBA players. I think she knew better not to walk on the dinner table, we did allow her access to the bathroom counter, window sills, and the coffee table though. Right when I was always going to start logging stats on the computer though, she seemed to have a spider sense to delay that stat-keeping, with her suddenly wanting to be held in my lap. She also knew not to walk on my APBA cards, which was interesting because the cat my brother and I had, would safely walk around our baseball cards that we collected. I believe they knew how important those things were to us, and I believe Isabelle knew how much I loved my APBA Baseball.

Due to my schedule, I always stayed up overnights on my days off as well, to keep my body's sleep schedule regular. And due to that, sometimes Becky would sleep on the couch, while I played APBA games at the table, so that Isabelle could lay on her, while watching her daddy rolls sixty-sixes. My wife Becky by the way finds my dice-rolling soothing, maybe Isabelle did too.

Over the 14 years-and-half that Isabelle was in our lives. Isabelle has inspired my custom card company named Izzy Productions, while I also named my APBA team in the Boys of Summer APBA Baseball League, the Traverse City Panthers.

She was our world, and we unfortunately had to dim the lights in our world, a week ago from today. Last Thursday, August 6th at 9:30 am, we said goodbye to Isabelle. 

[I wanted to add pictures, but the new Blogger setup is having server problems & drawbacks]