Ella

Given that Cutie is no longer among the living, we're down to just Ella, who was supervising my work on the new development of my lingonberry patch. She was talking to me in the first picture, probably letting me know that she hadn't given permission for a photo.

 

It's hard to tell. Because, as human beings, we tend to look for human reactions in our pets, we might see them where they don't exist. For example, the day after Baby Girl died, her most devoted daughter, Lydia, was lying on top of the stone beneath which her mother was buried. I saw meaning in that, but that might have been a place where she would have gone, regardless. Stones are warmed by the sun, and cats like basking in the warm places.

Ella is far more talkative now than she ever was before. She had never been particularly vocal, but now I hear from her all the time. Some time has gone by since Cutie died, yet Ella refuses to lie in any of the beds that Cutie had claimed, despite the fact that they have all been washed. It's not the beds really, but the places. Even if I put a new bed in that place, she will not go there. She might still think she's going to get slapped.

 

Thank you, @Lulu Moppet. She was my cat for her whole, long life. In fact, her mom woke me up when it was time for her to give birth. That was her last litter. She had three kittens, all black. Then, it seemed that she was done, and they all were healthy, so I went back to bed. She woke me up again, with a fourth one. In the middle of delivering it, she went into my room to wake me up. She must have known I was a paramedic. Since they were all black, I have no idea which was which, at the time, but Cutie was always the one who liked me best. Our 19th anniversary is coming up, but Cutie was with me for ten years before I was married.

Michelle likes to believe that Ella is her cat (yeah, she does seem to favor Michelle), but I tell her that Cutie taught her how to be a cat.

 

I talk to Ella as if she were a person, and she looks at me as if I'm out of my mind. But she pays attention and sometimes even responds, talking to me as if I were a cat. I think she's out of her mind, too.

 

I can relate to this.
I talked with my Chipper all of his life, even after he was old, blind, and almost totally deaf.
I have read that animals, at least the ones we are bonded with, can see visual images from what we are thinking.
If this is true, then even when they can’t actually see or hear, they still get the mental communication.

 

She could read lips.

 

Now that there's just Ella, she gets to decide what she wants to eat and, while she is okay with the Blue Buffalo kibble, she favors Earthborn when it comes to canned food. Some other holistic food just won't do. Cutie wanted every meal to be something different but Ella wants Earthborn.