Today is the one-year anniversary of my cat dying.
He got sick suddenly, the way cats do. They carry everything quietly until they can't anymore, and by the time you know something is wrong, you're already almost out of time. He went the same day. I held him against my chest while it happened. There was blood. I sang to him, told him he didn't have to fight anymore, told him I loved him, told him we'd see each other again soon. He was gone before the song ended.
I did everything right. I was there, I held him, I didn't flinch. I'm proud of that, and I've had to keep reminding myself to be proud of it, because the memory of that last hour is so loud that it drowns out everything else. The three years before it. The fact that he came to me at all. The way he figured out pretty quickly that he was safe.
The good memories are there. I work at keeping them in focus. But anniversaries do what they do, and this week has been rough. Not sleeping well. Head full of noise. Wanting to shut everything out and also wanting to feel it, and not being able to do either cleanly.
On a different note, one that's also maybe the same note:
I made a playlist. I've been calling it Rainy Safehouse Sessions, and it's not meant to be the official Safehouse soundtrack or anything like that. More like: this is what might be playing quietly in the background one specific night. Leon on the couch. Rain against the window. Nobody has to be anywhere.
People tend to picture Leon with louder music. Rock, metal, something that matches the chaos of his job. That's fair. But I keep thinking about the other version of him. The one who's finally still. Who doesn't need to be wound up anymore, just present. That's the version I make audio for, and that's the version this playlist is for.
The tracklist leans toward things that feel like 2am in a good way. It doesn’t fix anything. I don’t think music does that. But sometimes it gives the feeling somewhere to sit.
P.S. If you've lost a pet and are still carrying it: there's a picture book called P.S. I Love You More Than Tuna by Sarah Chauncey. I don't know how to describe it except that it gets it right in a way most things don't. Worth finding.