Last night, I saw a ghost.

The idea of ghosts has actually been on my mind a lot lately. I've been reading Trap Line by Timothy Zahn, a short story I found on Kindle that revolves around one engineer's ability to “project” a ghostly apparition of himself across vast distances and makes first contact with aliens. I've also been listening to a lot of P!nk on Spotify while my sister and I continue our obsession with Palia. Recently, while reminiscing on a quest I had done for two of the game's characters involving their mine potentially being haunted, the song “When I Get There” played, which is a beautiful and bittersweet song P!nk wrote as a letter to her late father in heaven. Today, my older brother told me, during a conversation about UFOs, that while he's never seen an alien or a likely UFO, he is convinced that he's seen a ghost. And lastly, I've mentioned a dozen or so times that Jiggy's Journal is a blog and email newsletter publication powered by a platform incidentally called Ghost.

Needless to say, my vision last night could have just been light and shadow playing tricks on my fairly vulnerable psyche. Maybe this is all just coincidence? But I'm thinking not after last night.

Kitten Season 🐈

To tell the complete story, I need to bring you with me back to the summer of 2016. I was torn when my Dad came to me with a proposal: a friend of a friend of his in Kentucky had two kittens that were only a few weeks old, no longer wanted them for whatever ridiculous reason she gave them instead of “the novelty wore off,” and was simply going to dump them on the street if she wasn't able to find a new home for them swiftly enough. “Do you want these kittens?” Dad asked, knowing very well that I wasn't going to let two kittens get dumped on the street as an alternative. “Do I have a choice?” I asked him, looking at him like he were completely nuts.

I had little time to deliberate whether or not I was okay with forcing Tigger, who was my one and only pet at the time, to adjust to a more chaotic living situation with what amounted to two new babies in the mix. There were also a lot of adjustments to be made on our end in order to accommodate them. Including, but absolutely not limited to, kitten-proofing the house. We even bought a small dog crate to put them in at night when we slept because I was fearful that one of us might squish one of them on our way to the bathroom in the middle of the night. (Don't worry—two nights into having them at home, they were completely free to roam the house at all hours. I couldn't listen to them cry!) But I wound up deciding to take them anyway. Because, honestly, who says no to sharing their home with kittens?

Then, one weekend in June, Dad brought home the two adorable little furballs of joy. I didn't know quite enough about cat biology this early into our journey with cats at home and wrongfully assumed that one of the kittens was a calico—a type of cat that is tricolored and almost exclusively female—due to him being mostly white with patches of gray tabby stripes in places. That explains why my nephew and I had initially given them the Star Trek-inspired names Curzon and Jadzia. We felt that they were highly unique names for kittens, but in retrospect, felt a touch too nerdy when my co-workers wound up needing a pronunciation after seeing my updates on social media. After learning at their first vet check-up that Jadzia was actually a boy, their names were quickly changed to what we know them as today: Rufus and Oliver.

Only about a month later, on what was easily one of the saddest nights of my entire life, Dad and I took a trip to the emergency vet with Oliver in tow. In the few hours up until that point, he had rapidly grown remarkably ill. So rapidly that it almost felt as though someone had flipped a switch in him. He had gone from energetic play with his brother to vomiting and was demonstrating an inability to stand or walk on his own. Dad could tell from his labored breathing simply sitting on the exam table that he was already suffering, and I did not want to subject him to further testing or procedures that they weren't even sure would help him. Ultimately, as extraordinarily painful as it was for me, I said a tearful goodbye and chose the only humane thing left to do.

I was profoundly heartbroken. The veterinarian, who remained very kind and compassionate throughout the entire ordeal, had told us that it was likely that Oliver had been suffering from an underlying disease such as FeLV (Feline Leukemia Virus), and we just didn't know since he hadn't been exhibiting any symptoms up until then. It wasn't our fault, but it didn't feel that way to me. I was highly upset at the possibility that maybe he had gotten ahold of and eaten something that he shouldn't have. I was also wildly fearful that his illness could have been spread to Tigger or Rufus, which resulted in us taking them to two different vets to be tested for FeLV and other diseases known to affect cats. Thankfully, except for Tig's constantly recurring issue with ear mites, they both checked out to be perfectly healthy. Thus, the world spun madly on...

The Bond That Lives On 💖

Even though Tigger and Rufus received clean bills of health, I was still uneasy about them. Especially when it came to the youngest of the two. Oliver had technically been the only constant presence in Ruf's life up until then. The way that Rufus constantly searched for his brother in those first few weeks without him made my heart hurt to watch. Sometimes, I think that animals have a better awareness of emotions and the world we live in than we do, but this was one instance in which I wish that I could have somehow given him the ability to say goodbye.

I consider myself a “crazy cat guy.” I love all three of my kitties, including my old man Tigger and our more recent addition, Cinnamon. They are practically my children. They are, without question, the loves of my life. But my bond with Rufus is special. The day we came home with Oliver's empty carrier, I made a promise to Ruf that I would always love and take care of him. Now that he didn't have his brother to confide in or to protect him, I felt like he was going to need a little extra love. While still painfully shy and could be considered the very definition of a “scaredy cat,” Rufus has been my best friend. He sleeps every night right beside me. And he has a way of always finding me when I need him. That old cliché about rescued pets rescuing their owners instead is true in a lot of ways between us. I tell my father constantly that Rufus is the best gift he ever gave me.

Perhaps the recurring theme of ghosts visiting us was what set the stage for last night's encounter. I've been up late gaming, tooling around with my website or server, and launching my new public forums (which you should totally join!) a lot lately. Last night was no different, until I walked into the kitchen to grab another soda and caught, out of the corner of my eye, what looked like a white-ish colored cat sitting in our living room. I had to do a double-take, and even after taking a second look, I still thought the cat was sitting there. It wasn't one of the others either, since they were all accounted for. It took completely glancing away and then back to the same spot again before the realization set in that no cat was sitting there and likely never had been. It was alarming, but after thinking about it from a few different perspectives, I'm convinced...

Oliver had paid me a visit that night.

I'm still uncertain as to why, but I do have a few theories. The first is that I've been dwelling a little on my own mortality. I'm still just learning at the ripe old age of 40 how to code/program and actually develop an understanding of how computers work. You see, I thought that gaining these skills might make me more employable, but I'm also aware that I'm getting into an age bracket that makes companies think twice. I'm also facing the unfortunate truth about how difficult it is to make friends as an adult. I'm an introvert, so it was already pretty hard, but trying to find time to “hang out” just isn't a top priority for people who juggle multiple jobs and/or take care of children. Almost everyone else my age has a mortgage and grandchildren. It's probably why the only other people I still know in this town outside of my family are retail co-workers that I don't even work with anymore. Whatever the case may be, I think Oliver's appearance last night—whether it was actually him from beyond or just a personal spiritual experience—means a couple of things.

It was a reminder of him being one of my babies, as brief as it was. It's a reminder of how much I love my family and my other cats. It's a reminder of my hometown back in Indiana and the friends I still have there. And the friends that I make going forward. I'm choosing to believe that the significance of Oliver's spirit being felt nearby means something. These connections never truly fade away, despite time or distance. Love transcends physical boundaries.

My grandmother passed away in 2011, but I still recall having a serious conversation with her during one of the major holidays before her death. I told her about how the days leading up to holidays like that one made me incredibly anxious. I knew that I was going to see distant relatives that I rarely saw throughout the rest of the year, and I would be socially inept. But it never shook out that way because when the day actually came around, striking up a conversation with everyone wasn't difficult at all. It was always as if no time had passed between any of us. And she told me that's just what it's like with family. My grandma, my late mother, and even little Oliver all remind me that love is maybe the only thing that lasts forever.

And forever is a pretty long time.