In late 1992, I was looking out of my living room window and saw a tiny tiger kitten running between cars at the farmer’s market across the street. I ran out of the house to rescue the kitten because she could have gotten really hurt. She had a flea collar on, but her owner was nowhere to be found. I decided to take her home to show my mother, who agreed that she was cute but we already had three other cats and a dog. I put the kitten back outside and thought about her all day. Later on, I looked outside again and the farmer’s market was gone … but the kitten was still there! She was being tossed around (literally) by some kids. Again I ran outside, picked her up (much to their dismay),
and took her home with me.
My birthday was in a few days, so with my parents’ permission, I used all of the birthday money I received to pay for the kitten – now named Chips – to be spayed and have her first shots. Now she was ours forever!
My other cats – Jazzy, Kitty and Buttons – and Holly, my dog, were not happy about the new addition. However, Chips didn’t care! She was a stubborn little thing that ignored all of the hissing and growling and just went to the food dish and plopped herself there.
She outlived all of our other pets, and toward the end she really didn’t do much of anything. She enjoyed laying on the bed with me and sleeping in front of our heater. On her last day, she had a heart attack and died in the waiting room of the vet’s office. She was stubborn until the very end and went out in her own way at age 19.
We will miss her every day, but she is with our other pets at the same pet cemetery and I know that she is in Heaven with them, waiting for us to get there so that we can all be a family again.
TO CHIPS: We will always love you and will miss you forever.
With Love Always,
| Chips |
| The Monteiro Family |