Twinkle Star, 2004-2025

In 2004, Kristine came home excited to tell me about a beautiful cat she saw in the local pet store: it was a young kitten, who had been rejected by her buyers and was being offered for adoption. The young kitten was living with a whole bunch of other cats in the back of the pet store, but they had to put her in a cage because she was being bullied by the older cats. 

I hesitated for a few months because we already had two cats (Patch and Iffy), but in January of 2025, Twinkle joined us. Her initial reception by the two older cats was not very warm: they hissed at her. I think that’s why she was so kind to Macavity when he was adopted in 2007: perhaps Twinkle remembered the frosty welcome she was given, and was determined to be kind to the new kitten. The two of them became a very close, with Twinkle acting the role of the grumpy older aunt fussing over the naughty kitten that Mac was. They often napped together in the sweetest way. When Mac passed away in 2020, Twinkle wandered the house for a while yowling and calling at night: I think she missed him, and wondered where her friend had gone.

Twinkle loved belly rubs. She had beautiful grey-white fur, but her belly fur in particular was soft like cashmere, and she knew it: she would flop on the bed and demand that you rub her belly, as much for your enjoyment (in her eyes) as for hers. Twinkle loved the bed. Specifically, she loved the bed when she had it all to herself - whereas Iffy loved to sleep in the bed when us humans were there, Twinkle preferred the whole bed all to herself. I remember coming home a few times and opening the bedroom door to see Twinkle grumpily looking up from her nap as if to say “Oh. You’re back. Fine. You can have the bed back”. In our new place, she loved napping in a sunny spot, and I loved seeing her enjoy the sun.

Perhaps it was her early experience being in a large cat run with all those other cats, but Twinkle grew up to be a very particular and discerning cat. When she was younger, you didn’t really pet her without her permission: you had to offer you hand to her, she would sniff it for as long as she needed to be satisfied that you were okay, and then she would move her head to pet herself using your hand. That’s right: you didn’t pet her, she used you to pet herself. A true character. She mellowed as she got older, and gave blanket dispensation for general cuddles and petting. Twinkle was also the most intelligent of all our cats. I remember this when I was playing with the cats using one of those cat toys on a stick: everyone else was chasing after the toy, but Twinkle looked past it and focused on the hand that held the stick that moved the cat toy. She knew who was pulling the (literal) strings. When we put the cat toys away that day, she went after the box they were stored in and tried to open the lid.

Twinkle was never quite the same after Mac’s passing. She’s been on a kidney diet for the last 4 years, and had been doing very well, but last year she started to slow down a bit, eating a bit less, and gradually losing weight. She spent 2 days in the hospital last week and they were pleased to report that she had got better, but when she got home she started ailing again. We brought her back to the hospital two days ago and again she looked like she was doing well, but today (13th Jan 2025) the vet called urgently and said she’s taken turn for the worse. I was at home recovering from an episode of vertigo so Kristine rushed to pick me up and we got there in time to say goodbye to her. The vet techs told us that she had moved herself to rest on my hat that I had left behind (for her to have a familiar smell while in the hospital) before she became unresponsive. She went into cardiac arrest, and was hanging on by a thread, and we made the painful decision to ease her suffering and let her go peacefully. Kris and I gave her a last belly rub as she passed. I think of her reuniting with her old buddy Macavity, who has undoubtedly been waiting impatiently on the other side of the rainbow bridge, keeping a sunny warm spot for her, and where her sisters Patch and Iffy have also been waiting to be reunited with her.