Beo is the cat in the middle. Binx, Meg’s cat, is to his left, Nala is to his right.
Here, Beo is the cat closest to the water bowl. Nala is the other cat.
I’ve written about Beo before. My sister adopted him and his two feral brothers some years ago and when she married her third husband, Neal, the three of the lived in her massive basement. Neal is allergic to cats. During Covid, she asked me to adopt one of them so I drove up to Marietta. Beo was the only one of the three who came out to say hi when I went into her cellar, so Beo was my choice.
A few weeks later, Mary drove him to Orlando, where I met her at Megan’s place, and the next day, I drove him to South Florida. He meowed during the entire three-hour drive and spent the next 10 days under the bed. When he finally emerged, he realized he could go outside and suddenly, he was living his best life.
Since 2020, when he came to lived with us, he has been the most vocal cat I’ve ever owned. Also one of the most affectionate. He gives head butts to any other animal in the house, cats, dogs, that head bump says, Hey, let’s be friends. Even humans got head bumps, particularly when he was high on catnip.
Three or four months ago, he suffered congestive heart failure. A cardiac vet saw him and put him on diuretics and a blood thinner. Daily meds. He started avoiding me because I gave him the meds, 3 liquid diuretics that were chicken flavored, and the blood thinner as a pill. But he appeared to be flourishing. When we went out to Washington state to see Megan in early September, our friend Liz came in to feed the cats and give Beo his meds. The vet had warned me that even with the meds, the heart condition might kill him.
We got in late on September 11/12 and when I walked into the bedroom, I found his body. It was still warm. The shock of finding a beloved pet like this, dead, triggers so many emotions. I started sobbing and picked him and carried him into the family room, shouting for Rob. Nala and Binx seemed acutely aware of what had happened. Both were skittish, then affectionate. I wrapped him in a towel and the next day, we buried him in a box in a corner of our yard where he often hung out.
When we picked up Nigel the next morning from a friend’s house, he seemed to sense Beo’s absence almost immediately. He especially noticed it when he was outside in the evening, where Beo and the cats enjoyed hanging out.
RIP, Beo. You are deeply loved and I hope you return to us!
