05/10/2026
RIP Rahu, noble soul. What an honor to be your pack.
Rahu passed cuddled in my arms in the wee hours of April 7. He was nearly 19. We had the privilege to live with him for 11 of those years.
“We bought a house, and the house came with a barn, and the barn came with a cat.” He was a feral hunter with a wide range and an infamous reputation for acting like he wanted you to touch him, then drawing blood if you tried. Extremely allergic to cats, I tried to find him a home, but no one would take him because of his rep.
I had recently lost Ike, the OG Entlebucher, my soul dog. I wasn’t ready to love dogs again. Cats were foreign to me. But, Rahu and I felt a bond. Slowly, it took a year, he came to know a human and I a cat. He would offer his belly and I’d tell him no, I knew he’d bite me. I fed him sardines and we gave him a heated cat bed in the barn. We’d climb trees together, and we’d snuggle side by side in the barn; then I’d go wash myself, change clothes, take medicine. I started weekly acupuncture in nyc, with his fur on my inflammatory meridians, to drive down my allergies, did that for a full year. Rahu started running to greet us, emerging from the hedges when we arrived at the farm (we were commuting then).
One day, he sat at the open front door of our house with his paws on the threshold, and we just hung out, feet apart, giving it time. The next day, he came in, wide eyed. The next day, he came in again, and discovered the sofa. You could see his neurons rearranging. He was indoor-outdoor after that. Then, one day, as we cuddled, he looked at me for a long time, rolled his belly towards me, and blinked slowly. I said, “Are we going to do this?” He blinked long and slow again. Gently, I put my hand on his belly. He relaxed. After that day, he trusted me and he trusted everyone, to pet him, hold him, carry him, anything. You could not out-cuddle that cat. I called him “the bravest heart in the house”, as he found his way towards being able to receive the love he’d always wanted.
To be continued in comments… [As always, all content and images (c) DCF, no sharing without permission and attribution.]
