Tina is our Buddha kitty.  She is round.  Her main goal in life is to not use her legs.  She is so ornery that not only does she refuse to use the litter box; she dumps her load right in front of it.

One time a Stellar Jay got trapped in the garage and she was thrilled.  Finally, Domino’s had delivered!  I got the bird out safely and she would have gotten mad but she was overdue for a nap since it had been a good ten minutes since her last one.

In the midst of trying to sell a home many years ago, I was bustling about trying to get everything perfect for an upcoming showing.  Tina meowed at the door and without giving it a second thought, I let her in. 

Unfortunately, she was not alone.  She had brought a bird into my sparkling clean house and when I tried to take it away from her, the bird decided this would be a good time to make a run for it.  Sticky, bloody, partially-chewed feathers went flying.  Tina rushed to get back her prize and the chase was on.  I tracked them down and forcibly escorted them out with Tina under one arm and the now-dead bird in the other.  I set both of them down on the lawn and just as Tina had settled in to enjoy her snack, the bird, which was really quite dead inside my house, flew away. 

The look she gave me was deadly.

She’ll let you pet her, sometimes, but when she’s had enough, she bites you.  If you quit before she’s through, she pokes you with her paw over and over again while meowing in an extremely perturbed tone.

Tina’s mousie victims all look alike.  They are kind of flat with eyes bulged-out but otherwise untouched.  We have surmised that the mouse, upon the sight of Tina’s massive girth, faints dead away and then Tina sits on it.

Tina also has a definite opinion when it comes to weather.

She’s against it.

Tina believes that if God had meant for cats to endure weather He never would have

invented air-conditioning and central-heating on the Eighth Day.

These stories you just read have been published in other columns but I’m repeating them here because today, we have to say good-bye to Tina.

We found Tina 15 years ago behind a restaurant in El Cajon, California.  She was so skinny and starving.  There were no residences for miles and cars raced in and out of the parking lot.  We didn’t see how we could possibly leave her there.

So, we took her home.

The other pets were less than thrilled to have a new roommate but they adjusted.  Tina outlived them all.

She quickly filled out to become our Buddha kitty.  She moved with us three times and saw our children grow from toddlers to young adults.  She saw other pets join our household menagerie and she saw them leave. 

She was cranky, not the least bit cuddly and perpetually out-of-sorts but we loved her as much as she would let us.

When she would sit outside of the garage in her favorite spot in the sun (which periodically annoyed her by moving) she was a presence.  Delivery people shied away and the neighborhood dogs were too intimidated to approach our house for a biscuit.  If they got too close, she would murmur that low growl in the back of her throat and they would quickly back away.

She was a homebody.  She was quite content to spend her days surveying her realm.  If you were doing quiet yard work she might come over to supervise and offer her critique.  In her opinion, whatever you were doing, you were doing it wrong.

In the last few years, I had to brush her as she could no longer groom herself.  Her roundness prevented her from reaching certain spots so I helped.  In shedding season, she would leave behind a small mountain of fluff after one of our sessions.  Upon seeing the piles spread out over the lawn, my kids would say, “Tina exploded.”

In recent months, she favored a corner of the sofa where she would perch and criticize my son’s video game performance.  Occasionally she would watch a Chargers game with us but she had even less patience with them than I do. 

You would think I would be happy I had 15 years with her but it’s very hard for me to smile today.  There are few people I have known for 15 years. 

It’s not like I didn’t know this day was coming.  Every responsible pet owner knows that once you let an animal into your heart, one day they will rip it out. 

Yes, I believe she will go to a place where her kidneys will be in good health and not in the complete renal failure they are in now.  I know she’ll be with my other furry loves: dogs Peppie, Tony, Sara and Rosie, cats Lucy, Ozzy, D.C., Simba and Peanut, Pudge the hedgehog and numerous guinea pigs.  There’s a spot for her there where the sun doesn’t move.

I know they’ll be waiting for me.  I just hope I’m found worthy enough to be with them.