Skip to main content

A Requiem for my cat

I buried him yesterday morning. His body was found lying dead and cold on the roadside. A speeding vehicle had killed him in the night. 

 He walked into our life as a little kitten five months ago. Someone had abandoned him on the roadside when the autumn sky was turning dark. He walked towards the only light he saw, the one outside our house. Maggie and I were baffled a bit. He was too small, would he survive? That was our worry. We had no choice anyway but adopt him. Thus he became our Kunju, the Little One. 

 He stole our hearts with his playfulness. He would climb into our laps and make himself comfortable there for as long as it pleased him. When Maggie worked in the kitchen he would jump up behind her and untie her apron knot. He thought we were his playmates. We allowed him to use us as such. We loved the game as much as he did. 

 We miss him immensely. Memories don't die. Even a cat refuses to die from memories. "Kunju has made you a different man," my friend said once. He was right. I learnt to be like a little boy when I spent time with Kunju. That was Kunju's gift to me: purification of my heart. 

Comments

  1. Pradeep NairFebruary 10, 2020 at 11:11 AM

    So sad to know this. We also used to have cats. Not now. And when they go, it leaves a big void.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalFebruary 10, 2020 at 1:35 PM

      I had another cat which disappeared a few months back. I consoled myself that it must be living somewhere. Now, this departure came as a trauma.

      Delete
  2. magiceyeFebruary 10, 2020 at 11:40 AM

    Heartfelt condolences.

    ReplyDelete
  3. JaiFebruary 10, 2020 at 12:03 PM

    Condolences Tom.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalFebruary 10, 2020 at 1:36 PM

      Thanks, Jai. Your personal message came as a soothing balm.

      Delete
  4. Vartika GoyalFebruary 10, 2020 at 4:27 PM

    Condolences.. hope you will feel better soon

    ReplyDelete
  5. Sreedhar BhattaramFebruary 10, 2020 at 5:39 PM

    Sorry to hear the sad news.. Pets do steal our hearts and often show us an entirely different life.. My condolences.. Wish you speedy recovery!

    ReplyDelete
  6. wingsFebruary 10, 2020 at 8:54 PM

    Deeply saddened to know about Kitty's demise. My condolences to you and ma'am.

    ReplyDelete
  7. rifle range boyFebruary 11, 2020 at 3:31 AM

    condolences on Kunju's demise

    ReplyDelete
  8. Ira MishraFebruary 13, 2020 at 4:34 AM

    I never had a pet.... But I can imagine it must be devastating to lose someone or something you have grown an emotional attachment for...!!May the good memories give the strength... For that's what holds the promise to be everlasting!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalFebruary 13, 2020 at 6:15 AM

      It is devastating, memories linger on like numbing pangs.

      Delete
  9. Rajeev MoothedathFebruary 15, 2020 at 10:20 AM

    So sad to learn of Kunju's death. I can understand your loss having cats as pets myself.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalFebruary 15, 2020 at 3:13 PM

      I'm yet to overcome the grief. He refuses to leave my memory.

      Delete
  10. Aishwariya LaxmiApril 18, 2020 at 9:38 PM

    Ohh! I just came across this post. I love cats and I'm so sorry to hear this:(

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl
47 comments
Read more

Two Nuns and two questions

The nuns kept in custody  Two Catholic nuns were arrested on 25 July 2025 at Durg railway station for allegedly trafficking tribal women from Narayanpur in Chhattisgarh to Agra in UP. Today’s newspapers in Kerala have expressed their contempt of the act more vehemently than I had expected. It seems secularism has hope yet in this country. For those who are not aware of the incident, two nuns were arrested because some criminals of a depraved organisation called Bajrang Dal in Chhattisgarh chose to conclude that the nuns were committing the crime of human-trafficking. Since that charge wouldn’t stick, because the women confessed that they were going voluntarily to take up jobs with the help of the nuns in order to raise their families from miserable poverty in a country that claims to be a $5-tillion-economy, another charge was fabricated that the nuns had indulged in religious conversion. Now let us look at certain facts. Though I keep questioning the Christian churches for...
8 comments
Read more

Missing Women of Dharmasthala

The entrance to the temple Dharmasthala:  The Shadows Behind the Sanctum Ananya Bhatt, a young medical student from Manipal, visited the Dharmasthala Temple and she never returned to her hostel. She vanished without a trace. That was in 2003. Her mother, Sujata Bhatt, a stenographer working with the CBI, rushed to the temple town in search of her daughter. Some residents told her that they had seen Ananya walking with the temple officials. The local police refused to help in any way. Soon Sujata was abducted by three men, assaulted, and rendered unconscious. She woke up months later in a hospital in Bangalore (Bengaluru). Now more than two decades later, she is back in the temple premises to find her daughter’s remains and perform her last rites. Because a former sanitation worker of the temple came to the local court a few days back with a human skeleton and the confession that he had buried countless schoolgirls in uniform and other young women in the temple premises. This ma...
22 comments
Read more

The Chhattisgarh Story

Deforestation in Chhattisgarh Kerala’s Catholic Church is teeming with rage these days because of the arrest of two nuns in Chhattisgarh on false charges. No one seems to understand the real politics behind the Modi government’s enmity towards Christian missionaries in Chhattisgarh as well as other backward states in its neighbourhood. Modi is selling the tribal areas and forestlands to the corporate sector part by part, his friend Adani being the chief benefactor. The Christian missionaries are a severe hindrance in that commerce. Let us get some facts right, at least. The Adivasi villagers allege that Gram Sabhas (local governing bodies) were forged or manipulated under pressure from Adani and the BJP government officials in order to take away their lands. In Hasdeo Aranya, minutes of the local body meetings were altered to show the villagers’ consent for land transfers. Also, the Chhattisgarh Scheduled Tribes Commission found that Panchayat secretaries were detained and coerc...
8 comments
Read more

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...
18 comments
Read more