Falling In Love Again

Last year my heart was shattered into a million pieces. On July 22, two days before my birthday, I took Byron to the emergency vet center and 4 hours later I said goodbye to him. It was the most devastating day of my life and I experienced a level of grief I had never imagined. Losing a pet is a singular experience. People can empathize, especially other pet owners, but no one can quite experience the grief in the same way as you - because you are the only one who is truly experiencing the loss. I was lucky enough to not have to be alone on that fateful day, but I cannot begin to tell you how alone the apartment felt once I got home. In the days that followed I slept on the couch and dreaded coming home to an empty apartment - not having my chatty little man waiting for me at the door or hearing him click around at night...It was deafening at times. 

I knew I would adopt another buddy, I'm a pet person and I knew I had room in my heart to love and rescue another baby when the time was right. About 6 weeks later I went to the shelter to look and ended up bringing home a little girl. Unfortunately for everyone involved the match wasn't right. Much like dating, sometimes you can have a great first date but the follow-up ones you realize you are on different pages. And so I waited.

On December 30, I knew it was time. I had been stalking the Animal Welfare League of Arlington's website for weeks and had picked out the perfect boy - Macaroni Bob. He was a big orange reformed tomcat. He was FIV positive and needed a special home and I was sure that was mine. I made an appointment to go visit him at his foster home and arrived promptly at 9:30 am on that Saturday. Once again, much like dating - a stunning profile does not a match make and I knew within minutes that he was not to be mine. On my ride home I debated whether or not to visit the shelter and check out the other residents or to give it some more time. After some back and forth I realized that it was silly to not go and keep dating, if you will, just because one match didn't work out. So at noon I headed back to the shelter and within moments of walking into the cat room I fell in love.

Ollie was in a cage at the back and as I walked up to his cage he mewed and rubbed up against the bars in a bid for attention. Upon opening the cage up - he let me pick him up and carry him to the holding room where he slunk around for a minute and then sat on my lap. I tried to play coy saying there were others I wanted to meet, but as the minutes ticked by, I knew that I was done dating and that I had found my perfect little man. He came home with me about an hour later and each day I fall a little more in love and so my dear readers, may I introduce you to the new love of my life, as you can see - he is living a rough life...