Content note: pet death. Please don’t offer consolation about afterlives or souls: we don’t believe in that and find those ideas deeply distressing.

Our cat Talisker died yesterday, Thursday December 28 2023.

Talisker (a.k.a. Tali), named after the Scotch whisky, was sweet and persnickety, stand-offish and affectionate, demanding and loving. She wanted things her way: she wanted laps to be exactly horizontal, she wanted skritches exactly how she wanted them and expected us to figure it out. She would often sit on our laps, demand intense attention for five minutes, then wander off. But she was almost always in the same room as us. She loved us and liked us and wanted our company, sometimes on our laps or at our feet, sometimes from a few feet away. When she did settle in on you for a long stretch, she really blissed out, and it was special:  it meant she deeply loved you and trusted you. Ingrid was her extra special person, and she sat with Ingrid a lot: I was her second-favorite human, and I felt it as a great honor.

And Talisker loved her sister Comet, wildly and ridiculously. The two of them were an extraordinary bonded pair, especially considering how different they were. Comet is a high-intensity cat, super playful and affectionate, with a constant need for activity and absolutely no boundaries. It was clear that Talisker sometimes found her annoying, but she had nearly infinite patience with her sister, and the two of them snuggled and played together for hours every day. (We sometimes called them the Two-Headed Tabby Monster.) Comet misses her terribly, and we miss Team Tabby almost as much as we miss Talisker for her own self.

Talisker had cancer for over a year and a half: we gave her treatment that worked well for quite a while, but then it stopped working. We tried a stronger chemo but it didn’t take, and we made the hard decision to have her euthanized. She died at home with us, safe and warm and loved. We love her and we miss her.

Again, please don’t offer consolation about afterlives or souls. We don’t believe in that and find those ideas deeply distressing. Thanks.