A bad year for cats

Ever since the boys were very young, we've had two cats. The same two, I mean. One per boy. We got them as litter mates when Son 1 was maybe three years old and Son 2 was two. (I might be off by a year.) One was a black-and-white male; the other, an all-black female. Right away the boys asked, "Which of us gets which cat?" Wife told them, "The cats get to decide." Sure enough, within a week Cat 1 was sleeping on Son 1's bed, and Cat 2 on Son 2's. That pattern remained fixed until we sold the house ... and maybe after, for all I know. Wife got custody of the cats.

The boys are both home from college for the summer, and they are staying with Wife. They made this decision for multiple practical reasons: she has an Internet connection (and I haven't gotten one yet); she has two cars, both automatic transmissions, and she hardly ever goes anywhere so they can use them (whereas I have one car, with a manual transmission, and I take it to work every day). Also if they stay with her they can keep an eye on her, in case she gets sick or delusional or crazy.

And she has the cats. Whom the boys love.

Yesterday afternoon, I got a text message from Son 1. He said that Wife and Son 2 had taken Cat 1 to the vet, who had diagnosed him with kidney failure and said he had to be killed. What about treatment? Not possible. If he weren't killed now, he would die anyway in a couple of days.

So now I guess she has one cat.

And I guess it is a good thing the boys are staying with her right now.
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P.S. The title of this post comes from my e-mail to Marie telling her about this. I chose it because Marie's cat, too, has been diagnosed with something life-threatening, though it hasn't required killing her yet. So clearly it's a bad year for cats ....