The Light shine on you, and the Creator shelter you.
May the last embrace of the Mother welcome you home.
– Shienarian saying, ‘The Great Hunt’ by Robert Jordan

My Dearest Lola,

I tried to move heaven and earth to find you. I did everything I could have done, without smashing into the wall myself. I wish I had.

I may have only held you in my arms for four hours, but you had my heart from the moment I heard your little cries for help; and I knew I was your mum from the moment the handyman brought you out from within our bedroom wall. I’m so sorry it took so long to find you, to rescue you, and to bring you into my arms. You are my baby girl, and you will always be my baby girl.

I should have known something was amiss when you fell asleep on my stomach, with your little raspy breaths, but I was so distracted by your little hiccups from your final feed. I could never have known that when I wrapped you up tight, that your lungs would give out, and that it would be the last time I held you to my chest and kissed your fuzzy little grey head good night.

I woke when your parted into the Summerlands. You let me know that you had left, I just didn’t want to believe it.

You are my brave, strong little girl. You held on for four days in an asbestos filled wall all alone. I am so proud of you for keeping up your meowing, otherwise we would never have found you. I could not sleep when you were crying out, and it broke my heart having to wait for someone to come. Sweetheart, I tried. I tried so hard.

I hope we get to meet again.

I did what I could with your final resting place. You looked so peaceful, sleeping just like you were when I last held you.

I put lavender, rose petals and sage in with you before giving you back to Mother Earth.

Know that you will always be loved, and that you will always be in my heart. You were meant to come to me, and I was meant to love you.

The Kitten Saga…

At first we thought it was “Charlie’s Missus” who had gotten into the roof and had a litter. And no, I don’t think Charlie is old enough to be a Baby Daddy, they’re just friends. On Monday I knew they were coming from the wall but my muggle was adamant that they couldn’t be in the roof, so we looked under the house. Not there.

Then maybe there was a litter in the gutter along the roof? On Tuesday I left work early to call the fire brigade, “Sorry to sound like a clique, but we think there is a litter of kittens in the gutter on the roof that the mama has abandoned.” The guy laughed at the clique, and four guys came out in the truck. Nothing. They couldn’t help as the cats didn’t meow when they were here, but started 5 minutes after they left.

Maybe they’re in the roof?

We opened the manhole and I left food for them trying to coax them out but no luck. We have 2.5m ceilings and Muggle managed to get in the man hole but even at 50kg thought the beams would break under him, and couldn’t see a way across. Rather than having a central manhole, they put it about 15m away from the wall we needed it to be (yes we have a big house, it’s an “we had money in the 50s” old house). There aren’t any other ways of getting in – we tried all the wardrobes and there’s no hidden entrance. I’ve called the vet, RSPCA, even the council with “who can help me?”

On Wednesday with the real estate agent on the phone in trying to get in contact with our land lord for permission to take tiles off the roof. Got permission, tradie was organised. I hoped the tradie would come early, but he came at 5pm, saw that he needed a ladder for the 5m height and said, “I don’t have the right ladder, I’ll come back tomorrow.” Here to Parramatta Nth would’ve been hell in peak hour traffic, but even after saying “they’ve been there for three days” he still would’ve lost light.

On Thursday after waking at 1, there was no way to fall back to sleep. When the kitten wouldn’t meow, my muggle would snore, or Charlie would shift and scratch. The couch is too small for me to lie on. I would’ve been up on the roof two days ago, but any physical way of me getting up there would result in a hole in our ceiling/veranda/garage. Why? I’m fat, and this is an old fibro house where even the back extension is in dire need of repairs.

We even took video recording of the vent because we thought we were imagining things. We weren’t.

The meows were getting softer, and after four days in an asbestos filled wall I was amazed it was still going. The tradie came, and did a fantastic job looking. He moved tiles on the roof, he got in and had a look, but in the end the verdict was in the wall, and the fibro had to come off.

We got her. One little kitten, no more than 10 days old, covered in dust, meowing. I took her to the vet who said that if I wanted to adopt her (hell yes) I’d need to learn to hand feed her, so I was taught that and how to toilet her.

At least she knew love, and held on until we could save her.