Tot

I've always prided myself on the fact that I'm not terribly sentimental over pets. I mean they're animals. They have short life-spans, and their demise is just a matter of inevitability. Surely, you wouldn't want to go before your dog or cat?

But I forgot about Tot.

One time when I was about 5 or 6, my dad let a neighbor give me a kitten which I inexplicably named Buttercup. She was a pretty calico cat and I loved her. She grew quickly and became an excellent mouser. She was an outdoor cat and being such, we didn't bother to get her spayed. Quickly, she became a mother and a grandmother.

After a few years, a litter of kittens was born to Buttercup's daughter, Calico. They were the cutest kittens in the entire world. There were two almost identical ones which my sisters and I named Lumber and Mill in honor of our father's place of employment. There was another one we called Stubby. She was the cutest thing. She was chubby and hyper and she bounced when she ran. We adored her. Then there was the runt. He was the sweetest. He was so small and slow and frightened, with slightly deformed ears and feet. The other cats didn't pick on him, but he was always by himself. He quickly became the favorite. He didn't grow at all, but stayed tiny and helpless. We named him Tot, and we'd feed him and baby him and love him.

One day, as things like this always do, my sisters came running in, with tears pouring down their little faces, screaming, "Mom just ran over Tot!" We owned a big Suburban. She never knew, and Tot didn't have a prayer. I ran outside in what felt like slow-motion and saw the lifeless body of the little cat in our driveway. My sisters were sobbing and begging me to do something. I walked over to him and told them to go inside. My second-to-oldest sister got the rest of them inside and I got a shovel. I couldn't stand to see him just lying there, and I didn't want my mother to see. She loved Tot too, and she would have been devastated.

I scooped up his poor little body with the shovel and carried him to the hill behind our house, where he never got to run with his brothers and sisters, and buried him. I don't really remember how I handled it, but I remember my mom getting all teary when she found out. I was glad she didn't have to see him. I think I put on a brave face, but I definitely remember silently crying for him late at night when no one could hear.

It all seems so silly now. I mean, he was just a little cat, and he probably wouldn't have lived very long anyway with all of his health problems. It was probably more humane this way. But no matter what I tell myself, I still feel a pang of sorrow every time I think about it.