Encountering the sacred

This is a story of mine from a while back, some of you may know it already, but I thought it would be good to share it here: 

I experienced the sacred today in the form of a battered up cat that I found under a truck as I was driving out of the car park at work.

He was finished, lying in his own urine, emaciated, and covered with flies and ants, maggots on his face. But he was still breathing.

I knew that this was my task, to love him for the last hours of his life.

I don’t work Thursdays, woke up feeling very reclusive, and decided I had to go in to prepare for Saturday. The students arrive, and I feel like an actress a couple of nights before opening night. No matter how many times you have experienced the curtain going up, you always get the rush, and you need to stay calm and focused before. I am alone in the office, alone on the campus, I shuffle papers, and I feel better.

I always have a very clear sense of those specific souls being put in my care, that I have something specific to bring across to them and I am always in a state of prayerfulness before.

I see this cat soul and immediately begin to protest, ‘No God  no, I have just had this most exceedingly vulnerable week. All I want to do now is put my costume on and go into the sea and then soak up the sun and be alone and heal and heal.’

To be honest I almost drive away, but I know that this is my task.

I call my animal loving friend who is busy with her weekly shop. Great. She gives me a number of the nearest vet.. I call and she says I can bring him by at 5pm. Again the voice in my head says, ‘He is dying leave him, that’s 3 hours away’. But my heart is breaking and knows that there is no way I can let him die alone.

No one deserves to die alone. Suddenly my Arabic teacher is there at my elbow. We communicate in German. I tell him I don’t know what to do. He says we don’t respect the animals because they can’t express their feelings to us. He says that if I care for animals this is a sign I care for people too. I say we all have souls. What I  don’t say is that I also believe that the trees, rocks and water have souls. I tell him that in my experience, the humans that have suffered the most are silent too, because they are so tired of talking, no one hears them.

But my ears are open, my heart is open, I am awake, and I am so thankful for that.

I assure Herr Ahmed he can leave. The cat is still breathing and moving his head to get rid of the flies. I pray with my whole heart that he dies, but he is hanging on for dear life. He looks like he was a real ginger monster, and now he is a soul struggling to cross over, just like any soul who has finished their work on earth.

I think of the little bit of hospice help I did in Germany, and the old people I took care of in England. And I know we are all the same. The soul clings to this life like a bee to a sugary stamen. I admire this cat. I don’t admire myself, I am still shirking from the task. I look around.

 An angel has appeared from nowhere. His car has a UAE number plate, he is wearing jeans and is smoking a cigarette and staring at the sea. I see him immediately, I mean truly see, and engage with him.. He helps me to get the cat from under the truck. We put him in my car on the front seat and cover him with the towel, my swimming towel. The last music he hears in his life is Led Zeppelin. I hope he liked it!

He is cold and he smells, but he is breathing and I find this so sublimely beautiful. The angel says, ‘Be careful of diseases’, and I respond ‘I have no problem with that’. I touch him softly and tell him he will be mine and I will be his, till it's time to go.

He spends the last hours of his life on my kitchen table in an open box. I am pottering around and telling him what a ginga beauty he is and how smelly he is. My kitchen is green, quiet and cool and I hope he doesn’t mind me joking with him. I don’t joke with him about the maggots on his face, because I don’t want him to know how bad it really is.  I tell him how strong and courageous he is and how much I admire him. I tell him my mother, Hester, the Great Cat Mother of the Cape, will be there to meet him and that he should run toward the Light with all his might.

Later I drive him to the vet; I have never met her before.. She is so tender with him, shaves a little patch on his foreleg and as she injects the green liquid, she says, ‘I am so sorry, so sorry’.

I have my hand on his ribs and I push my love into him as he breathes his last breath. He lets out his last meow; I am astounded at his life force. My breath sticks in my throat.

I am privileged and in awe.

I cry. I am glad I did not run away. I helped a soul have a good death. Thank you thank you. The vet kisses me and we get on with our lives.

Yes, one of my encounters with the sacred today.