My Buddy Ralph

My oldest kitty Ralph died this morning at age 13. He lived with my parents in Cairo, Egypt but has travelled with us to just about everywhere. We adopted him during the summer of 1991 when while he was living at our neighbor’s house in Urbana, Ohio, he kept sneaking out of there and into our house. Apparently he didn’t like the food there? The neighbors didn’t seem to sore about it, and he stayed around.

My sister coined the name “Ralph” for him, based on the character Raphael from her favorite movie at the time: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I’m not sure how the name fit, but he didn’t seem to mind. He was a long-hair cat, so at that age he looked more like a small poof-ball (i.e. way too cute to be an action hero). But he did have this thing for hunting field mice and chipmunks, an activity my mom called “mousing.”

Ralph was a mild-tempered little guy eager to make a friend. My mom babysitted for some neighbor kids for a few months. One of the younger boys liked to abuse Ralph, but every afternoon once Tyler fell asleep, Ralph would cuddle up on the couch next to him and sleep too.

In 1994 we moved to Saudi Arabia and Ralph came along, complete with his own special kitty visa and passport. Saudis love cats, and he loved all of the attention he received at the airport. I remember one of the customs agents sticking his fingers into the cat case, and my parents cringing fully expecting the guy to lose the finger to the sleep-deprived cat. But instead Ralph stood up and purred, letting the agent pet him with his finger. While we were in Saudi Arabia, we adopted two more cats: Max and Gus. Ralph took both of them in despite the fact that they liked to claw at him and pounce on him while he was asleep.

In 1997 we moved to Iowa, and then about 6 months later, to Kettering, Ohio. Ralph, Max and Gus all made the trip with us. When we got to Ohio, Ralph was happily middle-aged but was still up to his old mousing tricks. Once Max somehow caught a chipmunk and snuck it inside where it got loose where he couldn’t catch it. We brought Ralph in, and within 5 seconds the little chipmunk was caught and disaster was averted!

In 1998, my family once again made a move, this time to Cairo, Egypt. The cats got their shots updated, new visas, and snuggled up in their cat cases for the long flight (actually, it turned into a huge ordeal because their cat cases got lost along with the rest of our luggage – but we found out later that KLM took excellent care of them and they were well played with!). Unfortunately they had to stay inside the apartment since it was in downtown Cairo and the traffic outside was far too heavy there were too many stray cats running around.

This morning my parents took our cats to the vet for their checkups. My family and cats are due to leave Egypt in a week to permanently return to their house in Kettering, Ohio. On the way home from the vet, Ralph stopped breathing and my parents lost his heart beat. They rushed him back to the vet, but they were unable to revive him.

I think it’s always hard to lose a pet, but it’s especially hard to lose that one pet (if there is one) that has been there for your childhood. Ralph has been through it all with my sister and me. Whenever we got on a plane to make a bit trans-Atlantic move, Ralph was on-board. There was some comfort in that fact, especially when we moved to Saudi Arabia. When we got to our new apartment and the three of us (my sister, Ralph, and I) all explored it together, somehow that made everything feel better.

So here’s to Ralph, my childhood buddy