Maybe it's far too early to start writing this.
Thirteen years ago, my best friend and I moved in with his then-girlfriend, now wife. She had a cat named Zuli. Zuli was short for Lapis Lazuli, a name made in reference to the Lazarus Long Robert Heinlein novels. Zuli was a black cat, and a small cat. She had been the runt of her litter, and remained small her entire life.
Zuli was an absolute princess - she loved getting attention, loved belly rubs, and loved to talk with us, meowing melodically in response to things we said. She was a social butterfly - whenever we had guests over, she would eagerly come into the room and even sit on guests' laps. In those early days of youthful energy, she would leap up to catch flying bugs, often successfully snagging them out of the air. Among her many nicknames was "Zuli the Ninja Cat."
For the first four years we lived here, Zuli was an only cat, and received undivided adoration from her three humans. Her happy place, I think, was sitting on the back of our old couch while the three of us watched a movie or TV show together. She would post up on the back of the couch, staring out the big glass sliding door at the back of our apartment in what I called The Eternal Vigil.
I didn't know much about cat behavior at the time. Early on, she would sit at the doorway to my room when I was at my desk late at night and stare at me, slowly blinking at me. Not knowing this particular bit of sign language, I thought she was trying to keep from falling asleep so that she could watch me. The truth was not far off the mark.
She was surprisingly communicative - she could meow in a tone that conveyed that she needed something specific, rather than just attention (or "'tention," as I would often call it - I think pets inspire people to come up with an entire lexicon. Maybe that's just me). One night, after our back door was left unlocked accidentally, our two younger cats got it open and were hanging out outside on the balcony. Zuli went to my room, woke me up with one of those really specific meows, and led me to the open door, where a very guilty pair of twins saw me and rushed back inside.
In her later years, she loved nothing more than to sit on my lap when I was in the living room, watching movies, playing video games, whatever I was doing didn't matter. She would climb up there and very insistently claim my lap as her spot. It was such a gift to feel her love there, that warmth and comfort she felt in my presence, that sense that the natural state of things was for us to all be there together.
She lived to be an old cat. She was 17. She lived pretty well for a long time and then declined very suddenly. Today we said goodbye to her.
I've known her for about a third of my life. She knew me for most of hers.
She was a beautiful, smart, deeply loving cat. I will always miss her.
