This was brought into clear focus this week, because the shelter I work with lost one of their resident cats (a cat that just can't be adopted out, this one because he would be a sweet baby, and then savage someone at random) this weekend, and it happened without any warning. One day Simba was the lord of their back room, hunting any mice stupid enough to sneak in from the overgrown lot next door, and being his sweet/savage self. The next day he was struggling to breathe and they took him to an emergency vet. He was diagnosed with leukemia and was told the best thing they could do is help him over the rainbow bridge before he suffered more. They had him for eight years, and suddenly he is just... gone.
The timing of his illness was either just sad or blessed.
Because he was so unpredictable they kept Simba in their isolation room, which is actually this huge room they use for storage (food, beds, cleaning supplies, etc) Since he was the only one back there he had free reign of the room. Only a handful of people were allowed back there who knew how to react properly when he took it into his head to attack.
This room was... ill organized. Since only a handful of people were allowed back there it ended up just a complete mess. They are right next to an overgrown lot too, so mice would sneak in and nibble at the cat food if a bag got ripped. Simba helped there by acting as a mouser and protecting the food supply from the mice.
Well, this last Saturday they'd decided enough was enough. They closed the shelter and 20+ people showed up to clean it out. Simba had to go into a cage for the day, but that was okay. We took EVERYTHING out - including the shelving and gave it a deep clean. We even scrubbed the foor. Then we went though everything Marie Kondo style. Any food they didn't feed their cats that had been donated was set out to be picked up by a pet pantry. Any expired food was picked up by an organization that feeds ferals. Old supplies were tossed. New shelving was finally installed. It looked like a totally different room. We could see from the front door to the back door! They put in six large cages for cats in need of isolation care for longer than just a week or two. (Big 4'x3' kennels).
That night they let Simba back into his new domain. In the renovations he had gotten a new bed, and a new climbing tower just for him also.
Not 24 hours later he was gone.
Either it is sad because he never got to enjoy his newly cleaned home
Or
It is blessed because Simba had been sick for a while but knew it was okay to show it now that his services as mouser weren't needed anymore (aka, there were no more broken bags of food, the floor had been disinfected to remove any scent trails, all remaining food was up and out of reach...) and he could go home knowing the shelters isolation room would stay safe.
my friends who will let me one line at them in a conversation because... it's a conversation.
