Is it possible to get too close to your pet?  My favorite cat, Puff Ball, was the most loving animal I have ever known.  He had beautiful long white fur and his eyes were two different colors, one blue, one yellow.  He would sit on my lap for hours in the evening.  When I went to bed he would race me to the bed.  Then he would get as close as possible to my head and flop right on my face.  I didn’t mind because that was  ‘kitty love’.  Puff could nuzzle and purr with the best.  He was definitely my snuggle bunny.

     Then he stopped grooming himself and wasn’t eating or drinking as much as usual.  I took him to the vet and he spent five days in the ‘kitty hospital’.  I brought him home on a Sunday to wait for the biopsy results.  When the vet called, the news was not good.  Puff had a cancerous mass in his abdomen.  It was wrapped around his intestines and he was going into kidney and liver failure.  He was also slowly starving to death because his food couldn’t get past the mass.

   There was nothing that could save him except a miracle.  I prayed for that miracle, but to no avail.  When the vet put him down, I held him in my arms and wept like a baby as he breathed his last breath.

     I know that God loves animals.  Otherwise, why would He have created so many kinds of them and each with a special personality all their own?  I know God understands my broken heart.  I know His grace is sufficient for me.  So why does it hurt so bad?

     It has been six months now and I still wait for someone to race me to bed.  My other cats try to fill in for Puffy, but it just isn’t the same.  I miss him terribly, but I couldn’t let him suffer any longer.  I can’t believe that I loved that little fur ball so much.  I still get misty eyed when I think of him.  He was my baby.