Salamander
Fire Walking

Midnight, aka LBlS, has spent twelve of the last eighteen days hospitalized. The Prof elected not to have an exploratory surgery done that would have definitively diagnosed her problem, but odds are she has lymphoma of the gastrointestinal track. She no longer willingly eats anything except dried tuna flakes, and only three or four of them at a time. The Prof visits her three times a day, force-feeding her 2 oz. of canned cat food at each visit. That's barely maintenance level for her. She's developed a minor erosion on one of her eyes, and is having intermittent trouble breathing (partly due to excessive mucus production, but not completely explained by that). Her electrolyte levels (especially sodium and potassium) have become erratic.

Her red blood cell count has dropped to critically low levels twice, indicating she has a bleed somewhere internally. We have tried all reasonable treatments, including a shot that was given to her Friday night that should target the white blood cells responsible for her symptoms. There is no cure, but we've been trying to buy her quality time. I no longer believe we are going to be able to achieve this.

Tonight, if there is no sign of improvement, The Prof has decided that the kindest course of action will be to let her go. He is inconsolable, and has been for days now.

I have lost track of how many people I have sent this quote to. It's now time for me to embrace it myself.

Fragile Circle
We who choose to surround ourselves with lives even more temporary than our own,
live within a fragile circle, easily and often breached.
Unable to accept its awful gaps, we still would live no other way.
We cherish memory as the only certain immortality,
never fully understanding the necessary plan.

Irving Townsend, "The Once Again Prince," Separate Lifetimes, 1986.