I mentioned in my March update post that I would be taking a short blog break when my cat died. During the April heatwave here last week, she suddenly got wobbly, and she declined very quickly after that.
Yoyo was born in June 2004, probably near-but-before my seventeenth birthday; she was definitely 5-6 weeks old when we found her abandoned (her mother likely died), and I had to wean her off of kitten formula. Hand-raised kittens have behavioral issues, which has always been challenging to navigate, especially after she developed fear issues related to being present during the worst of the lead-up to my parents’ divorce, but I love her just the same. She made it to 18, just shy of 19. I think the worst day of the past few was Sunday. When I was meditating, she crawled/dragged herself over to me to try to sit with me (she loved being nearby when I was meditating and praying) and let out a meow that made me crumble apart. I had to take Tylenol this morning (which has an emotional dampening effect) because I was worried that I’d be crying too hard to speak to the vet on the phone.
At home, I’ll be taking a break from my main shrine for a short time (divination says about a week is fine, but it’ll be closer to two weeks because I’ll do a purification ritual and would rather do that on a weekend morning). In the meantime, I will do other types of spiritual activities that are more fitting for someone grieving (praying at my ancestral and Chthonic shrine, praying away from my main shrine for my year-long prayer commitment to Eir, grief-oriented meditations, maybe a reread of the Phaedo, &c.), and I’m planning to take (roughly) a month’s break from writing on KALLISTI. There is an automated post going up on the evening of April 23rd that I hope you all enjoy, but please understand that I probably won’t be replying to any comments until at least early May.
Yoyo will be cremated, and I’m not sure from an energy/conduct perspective what I’m doing with the ashes afterward, so if you have any insights about whether I should keep or disperse them (and, if I keep them, where), I appreciate that. One unintentionally supportive thing I did over the past few weeks was to acquire Hello, Goodbye: 75 Rituals for Times of Loss, Celebration, and Change by Day Schildkret, which I acquired because I’m interested in non-witchy ritual manuals that are easy to adapt to polytheistic religious contexts. It includes two options for ritually honoring deceased pets.
This post ends with a collage of life celebration photos.
KALLISTI 