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Chapter 14: Star Child or Cat Light? Winter 2007

Writing has always been easy for me. Writing down my thoughts, my wishes and my experiences was something I never had any difficulty with. When I was still at school, dictation and essay writing were compulsory subjects. Compulsory subjects that I got my top marks in without any difficulty. Today I see it again in one of my daughters. I see a lot in her. The same tenacity, the same self-confident optimism. There was never, can't! I could be enthusiastic about so many things! If I took something on, took it into my hands, I could move whole mountains.

*Mum, if you're ever in Rome, go and see it. You don't have to be at the Country Catalan Festival all the time. You can also take a break and visit Rome. Mum! Rome!...*
*How are we supposed to do that? Just chug through Rome?
*Why not? What's stopping you?

*The language, my dear, the knowledge of the city and the place... and perhaps the age that makes us no longer so youthfully courageous and optimistic* I thought to myself and again I saw it. That, just like I was back then. I had an imagination, a creativity, so passionately irrepressible. Today, this creativity is no longer quite so daring. Not quite as passionate. But it still burns, and yes, it can still really ignite.


Back then, when our breeding programme was in its seventh or eighth year, I wrote about the breeding process. But Andreas advised me to only mention the good things, the positive things.I shouldn't write about the losses, the fears and worries we sometimes had.*Why not?It's all part of it!It's our breed, it's us.
*You're right, but does anyone want to read this?Hardly.People only want to see what is beautiful and good.Look at yourself!
Do you want to see the gloomy, bad news on TV every day? Or hear it?*
*No!
*You see! So don't!

So I started to report on the breeding, the A-Riverway home. I always reported truthfully, but not always everything.
And as it turned out recently, it was probably the right thing to do.When a cat owner wrote to tell me not to report bad and sad things.Nobody would want to read that.I should tell them how nice everything was with us. Was it?


We also struggled with unexpected losses in our breeding programme. We also battled against diseases or parasites such as giardia.
We also had birth defects in the litters, which were clarified as to whether it was line-related or because nature had decided so.
We sometimes fought for the survival of the babies or for adults who had suffered an accident, such as Vali, for example, when lightning threw the roof tiles into the cat garden and injured Vali.Sometimes we were fighting for survival, because one examination took away all our savings and we didn't know whether we could afford the other examination or not.We were fighting against time because we saw our lives being snatched away from us in fast motion.We, the A-Riverway, have also been fighting all these years, just like all the other breeders! Only I was not allowed to tell.Because it wasn't proper.But breeding is not just about discovering and experiencing beauty, it also means going through the dry spell, the tunnel, and never letting go.Never!Never give up.
Because as breeders, we work with living beings who deserve that we never abuse or disregard their trust. Living beings whose responsibility we bear. We nurture and care for them to the best of our knowledge and belief. Breeding is so much more than just having babies!


I argued with highly educated people, people with specialist knowledge and sometimes I even argued with professors or vets and lab technicians. I explained to vets what was wrong with our protégé so that I could be thrown out because I didn't have the necessary expertise, only to be presented (by me) with a test result a little later that proved exactly what I was claiming.
But I also argued with Andreas because I was running out of time and I was scared.
But in the end, everything was fine for me if we managed to end this dry spell, this dark tunnel path.
It didn't matter where, when or how it started.The main thing was that we always managed to get back to familiar, calm, healthy paths.

But you, you were one of those beings with whom I had no chance! What did we both have left?
How much time did the two of us have?
Three months?
You were less than a year old and we hardly knew each other.
But I had no chance. I had to let you go.Never before had I accompanied such a young life on its last journey.You were actually still a child - a kitten and yet already a teenager.It was an incredible blow that shook me to the core.I didn't tell anyone about it at the time, I couldn't, I didn't dare.Your departure, your loss, was a failure for me.I felt guilty, had I failed?I was sorry, ashamed because I couldn't save you.
To this day, I have hardly ever told anyone and I only have vague memories of you. I had to bury you deep in my heart, it was the only way I could continue on the path of breeding. But believe me, letting you go in my arms, seeing you go, was anything but easy and I asked myself for the first time: *Is it worth it? Worth breeding?

Lux Felina Nubilus. You were an affectionate, lovable, beautiful cat man and loved to make us laugh.
Today I ask myself, were you a little angel?
Or a light that burnt out like a shooting star, a glowing kiss in the starry sky?

At that time, an Italian breed appeared practically out of nowhere. It was, so to speak, a high-flyer in the breeding world.
The breed came from northern Italy and had a boy from the very famous Danish breed:
La Foret. This boy won the world title in 2007 and so there was no stopping the breeding world, especially in our region.
Where or when have you had a world champion in your neighbourhood? So it was for me too.
I kept an eye on this breeding programme, but I couldn't find much information.
The breeders themselves were rather reserved, but not unfriendly.This cat: La Foret's Jakarta was soon the talk of the town and wherever he appeared, he won everything.Malicious tongues began to claim that his ancestors suffered from the heart disease HCM.But it could never be proven!Of course I watched him.I knew the lines very well and knew what he was made of.I knew exactly how he could complement our breeding girls.But should I dare?
Carefully and slowly, I felt my way through another breeding programme, which basically didn't know much either. However, as a mating had been carried out via this breeding programme, they did know a bit more about heritability and what I was told sounded promising. So I plucked up all my courage and made an enquiry.

Today I only remember that we were allowed to pick you up in a car park in northern Italy. I never saw the kennel.
A mistake?
Again and again I advise interested parties, every enquiry, every future owner to visit the kennel. But I confess, I never saw your home.
The transaction went normally and without any major problems. All I can remember is that you started to sniffle on the journey home.
And it didn't stop.
But the oppressive, queasy feeling that quietly and gently spread through my stomach wasn't caused by that.
It was probably a premonition that was quietly making itself felt and I didn't want to realise it, but I couldn't either.Because it was already too late!I remember how we kept you separated and went to the vet after the weekend of travelling.He in turn diagnosed a mild cold.You were treated and within 10 days it was fine and you seemed healthy.

I have no special memories of her integration and settling into our cat family. Nubilus was very social and affectionate.
He was modest, not pushy and was easy to integrate.
We took him to an exhibition in the kitten category. There he showed us his fun side.
Everything seemed to go smoothly and we were looking forward to a very promising breeding boy. But first Nubilus had to enjoy his childhood.
A childhood that was far too short.
You couldn't celebrate your first birthday.

I stood in this cold, almost sterile room. You were half lying in my arms with your eyes closed.
A few minutes earlier you had been screaming.
The pain was irrepressible. Suddenly you could no longer pass urine.
The vet told us that the cause was bladder or kidney stones and we were forced to operate. It shouldn't be a big deal and Nubilus would recover well.
However, the operation revealed that the kidney stones were of both types and relatively massive: struvite and oxilate.
We were unable to feed him special food or a special diet. We never gave up hope, but that faint feeling was there and I basically knew that it was much to be hoped for....

The operation gave us exactly 30 days more time. Time to stand in this cold, almost sterile room again, waiting.
You in my arms.
The next examination revealed that the chances of recovery were zero. We were able to perform a second operation, but we were not given more than 14 days.
The kidney stones were getting bigger and bigger. *Mrs Gort, I'm sorry, but a second operation is completely pointless here.
He won't make it, not like this.
You would only make him suffer.... I'll leave you alone now, take your time.* Words, they echoed, faded and there was silence. I saw those eyes, his eyes, and what was going on in my brain was a wave of indescribable feelings.
I wasn't ready, I was hopeless, I got angry, I stagnated, lost that inner hold, wanted to attack, didn't know how, nor who, and all there was was this silence, in a cold, almost sterile room.
I warmed you as best I could, held you in my arms, didn't let you go and knew I had to!

Never before have I had to walk such a path with a young life. This hopelessness turned into sheer rage.
But who should I turn it against?
Against you? Andreas?
Our vet? The breeders?
Or ultimately against me?
Was it karma? Because I was aiming high? At any price?

We took the path with Nubilus, a path that simply wasn't meant to be. But life doesn't stick to our scripts, it has its own.
Nubilus fell asleep in my arms.
I saw how the breath of life left his body and departed. There were no questions.
I had lost. I felt incredibly guilty, I had lost, I couldn't save such a young life.
I kept asking myself what I could have done differently.
Could I have helped? Could we have saved you? But our vet showed us that it was inevitable. I had to learn to live with it.
It was a moment that made me think. Was this breeding?
Was that what I wanted?
Was it worth it?Today I can say that it is breeding!As a breeder, you not only experience births, life that grows and flourishes.As a breeder, you also have to learn to accept the big universe.Some beings come into this world for the flap of a wing, be it a human or an animal.They come and they go.Other creatures stay for a while to say goodbye to us and others stay for a longer period of time because they want to meet us, learn or accompany us and sometimes you pay an incredibly high price as a breeder. Not just financially, but above all emotionally. Nubilus Zucht received the news, was dismayed and broke off contact.
For whatever reason.
However, Nubilus remains a part of A-Riverway. Even if no offspring live on through him, he has enriched us, me in every way and at some point my big joker, we cheer each other up again.

The vet at the time is still working today. His practice is new in my neighbourhood and he remembers it just as we all do.
But my journey continued because we never give up.
Never! Because we walk this path. A path in the sunshine and sometimes in the dark. Because every being is worth it.

*Are you visiting Rome now? My daughter asked me.
*First we want to see how we travel to Italy and then we'll see* I replied.
Coincidence? or fate that I've never been to Rome? Never been to Milan and am planning this trip right now?
A journey with a completely different destination and yet, right now, a little Italian, his fur deep blue, is sitting in front of my inner eye.Those eyes look at me curiously, attentively and kindly.....

And next time this journey will continue.
Sincerely
Yours
A-Riverway

(Translation Deepl)