Wow. Just…wow. I haven’t really had the heart for writing my blog lately because I’d still been healing from losing Wanda. Now we’ve lost Otto, too.
We should have seen the signs. Otto seemed more depressed after Wanda passed, and understandably so. The two of them had been joined at the hip for 16 years. More than that, even, because they’d been together in the womb as well. When Otto started losing even more weight and not seeming exactly right, we should have known. But we chalked it up to grief. In spite of numerous trips to the vet, nothing concrete ever showed up. He began having dental issues and in February, had a minor stroke. We nursed him through all of it, not realizing that there was a bigger issue brewing on the horizon. Unfortunately, Otto was also exhibiting the first signs of pancreatitis.
Rather than going through a long, depressing narrative of how we finally got here (and with two seizures involved, believe me–it’s depressing), I’d rather focus on all the things we loved about Otto.
Otto never met a stranger. Otto loved everyone who came to our house, particularly men. One time, as chronicled in a previous blog post, our vet made a house-call and even then, Otto couldn’t get enough of the attention.
Otto had unusual ways of saying hello. We used to call it the Otto handshake when he would walk up to someone, put his paws on the side of their leg and do a stretch, claws only slightly extended. It could be disconcerting, particularly for non-cat people, but it was just Otto’s way. He had a great, purry, growly voice that contained so much emotion it was impossible not to get his point. He even had a name for Sean: he called him “Ow-wow.” I know that sounds weird, but it’s true.
Otto liked to play hide-and-seek. When he was younger, we would make a game of letting Sean hide and Otto and I would go “look” for him. We’d peek around doors and furniture, and Otto would look up at me with his gorgeous blue eyes sparkling, as if he thought this was the best game EVER.
Otto liked to play the box game, where he gets in a box and you pretend your hand is an animal trying to get in. He loved to play with your sock feet, which he would rabbit-kick gently. Sean points out that he would never do it if your feet were bare.
In his later years, Otto learned how to knead. Wanda had been doing it for years, but Otto started late and made up for lost time by being extra-vigorous. He would lie between my legs and grab my thighs or calves with his enormous eagle-talon claws. I told Sean it felt like getting a massage from a lobster.
Otto was gentle. If he didn’t like something you were doing, he wouldn’t bite, or even swat at you. He would gently grab your hand and hold it, as if to say, “please don’t.” Even the vet got to experience this. We hardly ever went to a vet’s office that Otto didn’t collect a fan club. He was so personable, gentle, tolerant and beautiful that everyone fell in love with him.
Otto was tolerant. When he was a small buddy, Sean could demonstrate this by holding him upside down and vigorously petting his belly. Otto just purred and purred. Witness the pictures of Otto in (albeit loose) clothing:
Otto knew a bunch of human words. When he was little, Sean was able to tell that he knew the difference between “front porch” and “back porch,” and Otto would always run to the correct one. Otto was also whip-smart. We taught him early how to stay on concrete, so he a.) wouldn’t get in the grass and get fleas and b.) wouldn’t try to bolt out to our road. He always stayed right with us. Once, he cautiously turned around and looked for us while gingerly putting his paws down toward the grass. All it took was a stern “Otto!” for him to stop and get right back on the porch. He was just testing us.
Otto was equal-opportunity. He used to do something we called the “fifty-fifty plop.” This involved waiting until we were sitting together on the couch, and he would position himself so he was sitting exactly half on Sean and exactly half on me.
There were so many things in life that Otto liked to do, but the thing he liked better than anything else in the world was being with Sean. Wanda may have had the advantage on Sean in the whole “blood-kin” department, but Otto adopted Sean as his own flesh and blood and the feeling was mutual. There was no place that Sean could go that Otto didn’t want to be. If Sean was outside, Otto wanted to be outside. If Sean was in the bathroom, then Otto needed to be there, too. Sean and Otto watched basketball together. They went outside and watched the turkeys together. Later, they watched egrets and herons, bats and ospreys. Sometimes, when Otto didn’t want to watch anything in particular, Sean would hold Otto in his arms, cradling him like a baby, and Otto would tuck his head in and hold on to Sean’s chest. I always thought it looked like he was nursing. (Sean always hated it when I said that.)
If ever there was a human/cat bond stronger and more beautiful then their bond, I’d be surprised to see it. Their love and devotion to each other was otherworldly. The word “soul mates” leaps to mind, but the term has been so overused and undervalued that it doesn’t even seem like a strong enough term for what they have had. What they had was a deep, powerful understanding of who each other was at a soul level. You could see it in the way Otto would smile at Sean. He did this thing we called a “pucker” where it looked like he was imitating a human kiss. His whiskers would go forward and his eyes would kind of squint. Wanda did it, too. They were the only two cats I’ve ever seen do that.
We miss it already.
Otto and Wanda were two of a kind. Two peas in an adorable, furry, Siamese pod.
But what Sean and Otto had was even more special, in my opinion. They spanned the canyon of two completely different species who reached a deep and abiding understanding of one another. Sean instinctively knew what Otto needed in any given situation and gave it to him. Otto, for his part, instinctively knew what to give Sean to make him feel needed and loved. It was a love story for the ages. And it will know no end.
Because, to paraphrase A.A. Milne, wherever they go and whatever happens to them on the way, a boy and his cat–his smart, loving, beautiful, gentle cat–will always be playing.
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| In Loving Memory, Otto Dennis, October 31, 1999 to June 1, 2016 |
