[Leica] IMG: Kofi

[jhnichols at lighttube.net (Jim Nichols)]

So sorry for your loss, Douglas.  Many years ago, we lost our black cat, 
Poo, under similar circumstances.

Jim Nichols
Tullahoma, TN USA

On 11/22/2013 5:22 PM, Douglas Barry wrote:
> Today will not be a day I forget easily. It's JFK's anniversary and I 
> have
> another reason. I'm sure you all remember where you were at the time and
> what you were doing. At 13 years of age, I was upstairs in my bedroom -
> specifically in "Alcantara", Granville Road, Foxrock Co. Dublin - writing
> an English essay - I used to remember the name of it up unto about ten 
> years
> ago - when at at around 7.15pm GMT my father called up to me that 
> President
> Kennedy had been shot. We were all horrified.
>
> JFK & Jackie had only been in Ireland that June, so the fact that he 
> was so
> young, so friendly, so outgoing, the first US President to ever visit
> Ireland, had the Jackie factor, and was of Irish descent, endeared him to
> everyone here. The pair of them cut a colourful swathe through Irish 
> hearts
> who were used to the bleak flat pronouncements of stooped grey Irish
> politicos like Eamon de Valera. To all of us Irish, the shots in 
> Dallas had
> killed one of our family, and robbed us of a brighter future.
>
> Wish I could remember the name of that essay now. It's probably incipient
> Alzheimers....
>
> Yet, today, at 12.08pm GMT, another more personal tragedy as our cat 
> passed
> on. Kofi was 16 and had developed cancer recently. Losing his sight a few
> months earlier, he still managed to navigate well. He used to spend 
> each day
> outdoors, stay indoors during the evening with us, and sleep outdoors at
> night. However, once he had developed cancer, we let him sleep in the 
> dining
> room with a litter tray.
>
> Yesterday evening, he started to do small circles of confusion, seemed 
> quite
> unwell, and later it took me a while to get him to stay in his bed. This
> morning, I found him jammed in an alcove in the tight space between a
> cabinet and the wall. He couldn't reverse himself out and I didn't 
> know how
> long he'd been there. So, reluctantly, my 21 year old son and I took 
> him to
> the vet. The prognosis was grim, so my son agreed to let him be put down.
> One injection to make him sleep after about ten minutes, then two in the
> heart, and then, after a further five minutes, another two were 
> needed, as
> he was fighting mightily the onset of the eternal shadows, and he was 
> gone.
>
> Kofi was a great mouser, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKIqSF3kBnk and,
> much to our delight, a great ratter too. Unfortunately, as well as 
> slaying a
> large number of the rodent family, much to our dismay, he had a taste for
> birds which he dumped as offerings at the back door. The largest offering
> was a splendid cockatoo which must have heartbreaking for some loving
> family.
>
> He'll be missed, but the Kennedy memorial industry will always remind 
> us of
> Kofi's anniversary.....
>
> Here are the two final pictures of him.
>
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/DouglasBray/Kofi.jpg.html
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/DouglasBray/Kofi_s+Last+Journey.jpg.html
>
> Incidentally, how many of you remember where you were & what you were 
> doing
> on that day in 1963?
>
> Douglas
>
>
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