Saying Goodbye to Belle

Belle, (also known as Sweet Pea, Tinker Belle, Shark Kitty, Stinker, the Quilted Kitty, Password-Protected Kitty, Squeater Pea, etc) was a sassy southern girl from humble beginnings. We found her in the spring of 2001 living near an old farm house in South Georgia with eleven little brothers, sisters & cousins. She made an immediate impression on us because as we were feeding all of these baby kitties with a syringe of milk, Belle was the biggest pig of them all. She ate until her belly was so tight that we were worried she might explode.

Well, as you can see, she was a really cute kitten, so one of the teachers my mom worked with quickly offered to adopt her. She also quickly regretted her decision when Belle decided to chomp on her infant daughter. So, long story - short...Belle and I ended up moving away to college together.

Belle made my empty apartment seem not so lonely and definitely kept me on my toes as she proved to be quite the trouble maker. She became famous for running around with full rolls of toilet paper in her mouth and once went running through my crowded kitchen with a red & white pom pom held high in her teeth. (She was a big UGA fan!)

One of Belle's favorite things to do was to get in places she shouldn't be...like in dresser drawers, on top of the kitchen cabinets, inside the lining of a boxspring, on top of the tv, on the table....some might say she wasn't well-behaved. I thought she was creative. :)

Every time I went back to my mom's house for the weekend, I took Belle with me because I didn't want to leave her home alone. Well, one weekend, she got outside, went under the porch and refused to come out. I will never forget watching my mom lean over the edge looking for her, losing her balance, and flipping over into the bushes. We laughed so hard, we nearly wet our pants! My mom ended up pulling the lattice off the porch and yanking Belle out from under there. That was the beginning of a tumultuous relationship between Belle and my mom. (A few years later, my mom was coming to visit us in our first apartment and we walked into the guest room to find throw-up right in the middle of her pillow. Nice, Belle.)

When I decided to move to Illinois, taking Belle & her brother, Pongo wasn't even a question.

Neither of them ate or went to the bathroom the entire 13 hour drive from Athens to Bloomington, but they were good sports and adjusted well. My dad even cut a hole in my bedroom wall so that they could come in and out to go to their litter boxes. I found many funny things stuck in the hole that Belle had found in the basement storage room. The funniest was a paint roller - she tried that one over and over again.

Belle was a very loyal kitty and didn't give her affection to just anyone. Our friend Jerrod called her "password-protected" because she would sniff your hand several times before deciding whether or not you were allowed to pet her. Mary Campbell didn't wait for Belle's permission and learned the hard way - she decided to call Belle the "shark kitty" after that encounter. (She didn't bite her very hard, in Belle's defense.)

Belle was such a good sport and put up with my many attempts to make her wear cute clothes, a harness with a leash, funny collars, etc. She actually loved wearing collars - I think she thought they were necklaces because she would prance around with her head held high. She wasn't such a big fan of clothes - especially the Halloween t-shirt I bought her.

When we moved into our house, Belle was really excited about all of the new places she could hang out. She especially liked all of the stairs and the fact that she could chase ice cubes over the entire first floor because of the laminate floors. The mantle was one of her favorite places to sleep and we found her up on top of the kitchen cabinets on more than one occasion.

When we brought home two kittens in the fall of 2006, Belle wasn't so happy. But she quickly learned to love her new playmates and taught them everything she knows about getting in trouble. We quickly learned that our bed wasn't big enough for us plus three cats, but it was just so stinkin' cute to find them all cuddled together in the middle of the night that we never decided to kick them out.

Among the things that I will miss the most about Belle is the fact that she played fetch. I've never had another cat who would chase after a toy and bring it back to me...over and over and over....and over again. She was such a playful and fun kitty who always made us laugh.

The past couple of days without her, we've realized just how big of a part of our life she really was. Almost every morning would start with Belle jumping up on me to let me know that it's time to stop pressing snooze. Then she'd wait on the bathmat while I showered and sit on the counter while I did my makeup and my hair. She'd sit in one of the kitchen chairs whenever Chris and I ate, and just two days ago she made us laugh by swiping the milk carton ring off the table with one of her paws when we weren't looking. When we'd watch tv, she would be purring in one of our laps or on top of the tv. And every night, she'd fall asleep right in between our heads. Oh how empty that spot felt last night....

Saying goodbye to Belle is something we weren't expecting to do this week, or anytime soon. Her life was too short, but she definitely made the most of her days. We buried her yesterday at Chris' parents' house in a beautiful box with beach pictures on it. We laughed about the funny things she did, like knocking over glasses of water for fun, and cried about how empty our laps are going to feel without her. And we woke up this morning, missing that annoying kitty walking on top of us too early on a Saturday morning. :(