Disc Golf at the End of the Universe!

Pearl

Pearl was our first cat as a couple. We first saw her at the Cherryland Humane Society shelter in Traverse City. There were a lot of cute cats and kittens that got our attention that day. On the following day, Jennie instructed me to return to the shelter while she was at work and "come home with our cat". I knew that this calico had seemed the most excited to meet us at the shelter, so she was the pick. The day was December 7th 2004, and as a Military History guru I was well aware that it was the anniversary date of the Pearl Harbor attack. During the ride home, this little calico in her carrier was a bit scared by her new surroundings and was meowing in a questioning tone, almost singing, while Janis Joplin was playing on my car stereo. Janis' nickname, and the last of her albums was called "Pearl" - so it seemed like the perfect name for our new girl.

Pearl was at our home for just a little more than 2 months, when she darted unnoticed out into the garage. I did not realize the main door was open, and when I went looking for her and could not find her in the house, I went out into the garage and she was nowhere to be found. It was a very cold and snowy February day, I could not even see any trace of tracks. I went looking all up and down our road, asking neighbors if they had seen her, with no luck. I printed up a "lost cat" flyer and placed it at several locations, and called Cherryland and a couple of other local rescue organizations to ask them to keep an eye out for her. She was not wearing a collar or any tags at the time - and I would not make that mistake again with any of our other cats, even though we meant for them to be indoor only. A week went by and we were about to give up, when I got a call from someone almost 2 miles away that she thought our Pearl might have come into her house when she let some of her indoor/outdoor ones back inside. I went there right away and sure enough it was our girl, and was she ever happy to see her Daddy!

The following December we adopted our 2nd cat (Cincy) top keep Pearl company. She adopted Cincy like she was her own kitten, and the two spent a lot of time playing together and often curled up sleeping together. About 2 years later, I had just come out of the shower and went to go check on the kitties, and to my horror I found Pearl on one of our beds with her eyes and mouth open but unresponsive. After the initial shock of her death, I took her body to our vet to have them find out what happened to our girl, just a little more than 3 years old, I wanted to make sure it wasn't something bad she had gotten into. The exam discovered that she had a genetic heart defect - cardiomyopathy. Our vet said most cats born with this condition usually have one deformed valve and don't survive more than one year; Pearl had two, one too large and one too small. Our baby was one of a kind for sure and she was missed desperately by us all, just like her namesake she passed away at a very early age.