New Year's Eve, 3:45am

For years I have told my vet that when a cat gets sick, I do too. He tell me there’s no scientific evidence of a shared cat/human pathogen, each species has their own version of things, their FIV to our HIV etc. But with the perspective of 50 years of veterinary practice, he tells me “there’s a lot we don’t know yet.” Poor Sapphire is sick, all sniffly with her eyes watering and I have a sinus headache, had my New Year’s call w Lucy in a raspy voice, and coughed myself awake at 3am. Earlier in the day while my radical lesbian doc inspected my ankle and decided against another injection right now, thank goodness, I told her about the never ending cough, followed by the nasty stomach virus and now this. “I thought the immunoglobulins were supposed to protect me from stuff,” I said. “They are,” she said and we fell silent for a moment, considering that. “But I haven’t had shingles or thrush”- I used to get both repeatedly. “That’s something,” she says, carefully disinfecting and patching up a couple of mystery scrapes on my ankle. I have no idea what happened and they’re no big deal, but she knows my propensity for infections and she’s not taking any chances. Later, after my neighbors set off fireworks closer than ever before and send the cats running everywhere in panic, I fall into an uncomfortable sleep. In my dream the one Sapphire sneezing on my pillow in her little fuzzy lavender sweater multiplies into dozens of football sized black kittens wrapped in blankets burrito style. I’m responsible for protecting them, and I somehow have them all under my arm, a dream logic version of having them under my wing I suppose. It’s not clear how I decide, but every now and then I hand one to a person I can’t see through the heavy fog but consider trustworthy. Which is the point at which I cough myself awake. I give Connor his extra meal, he doesn’t eat much, and I am afraid we’re on the downslope of this thing, an unbearable thought. If Sapphire is still sick on Friday when the vet reopens I will take her. For myself, I just take some Nyquil and hope for sleep to chase away these tears.

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