Carbunkle

Ethan tells the story of a special boy named Carbunkle.

Dead Pets is a podcast about pet grief that celebrates the lives of the creatures that have changed ours.

For more information www.deadpetspodcast.com.
Do you have a dead pet you'd like to share? Email deadpetsofficial@gmail.com. 

Transcript

Carbunkle - Dead Pets Podcast Transcript

Episode 2, Season 1

Elyse Wild (0:06)
Welcome to Dead Pets, a podcast about pet grief that celebrates the creatures who have changed our lives and left this mortal coil. I'm your host, Elyse Wild. Today, Ethan joins us to talk about a very special cat named Carbunkle.

Ethan (0:25)
He was a short-haired domestic black cat. His full name was Carbunkle John McClane. I can elaborate on that name if you want me to.

Elyse Wild
Yes, please do.

Ethan
So Carbunkle is actually a character from the Final Fantasy series, and it's sort of like a cat-adjacent looking creature. Basically, you summon this creature. It can cast protection magic and healing magic and stuff, and it's just a very cute little thing. So I thought Carbunkle would be a nice name, and I was playing the series at that time. And then, of course, John McClane—the main character in Die Hard—that was my brothers' idea. Both of my brothers' idea. So I was 14, and my brothers were older than me significantly, and I just wanted a video game thing. And they were like, "No, let's do a movie thing." And I'm like, "Okay, well, compromise." You know, you could have your Die Hard thing, but we're going to mostly just call him Carbunkle.

Elyse Wild (1:51)
What a great name. I love it. So you were 14. How old was Carbunkle when you got him? Was he a kitten?

Ethan (2:00)
We found him under my dad's house—the whole litter. I don't know what happened to the parents. I figured, why not take one of them? I was living with my brothers at this time, so we all just kind of decided to do one big cat parenting, I guess.

Elyse Wild (2:23)
Did you guys take the whole litter and give them away or raise them and then keep Carbunkle? Tell me about that a little bit.

Ethan (2:31)
I wanted Bunko because, well, he was the smallest. He was definitely the runt. I've had an affinity for black cats, even at a young age. He was my first pet—like, for real, like I have to take care of him type thing. You know, I had cats before that in my earlier childhood. None of them were black, though. But something about the void. You know, I'm 14. We just got Bunko, and I'm living with my brothers because of silly parental stuff.

Elyse Wild (3:18)
Were your parents not able to agree on custody?

Ethan (3:22)
I lived with my mom and I saw my dad on weekends and Wednesdays and stuff. But I had a tenuous, let's say, relationship with my mom, and eventually she couldn't raise me anymore, so I lived with my brothers. I got Bunko, and now me and him are both kind of just growing up together in this chaotic environment. My brothers are in their mid-20s, early 30s. As you can imagine, you got some young dudes with their own place. Me and Bunko basically grew up in a frat house. There was just partying all the time—mostly responsible, not too many insane things happened. He was very skittish, you could imagine, because of all the activity going on all the time. He would just hang out in my room almost constantly. So we started to get a bond from that, from just stepping away from the chaos, basically.

Elyse Wild (4:50)
Well, like you said, those are—that's very normal for guys of that age. When you and Bunko were hanging out in your room, were you also looking to kind of get away from that?

Ethan (5:02)
When I was 14, 15, 16, I was very put off from alcohol and stuff like that. I'm cool with it now, but at the time I was like, "I'm never going to do that." I was kind of like a straight-edge kid. But my bond with Bunko grew stronger. He actually learned his favorite exercise, which was—I've got this useless skill where I can throw playing cards. So for hours, I would just chuck cards, and he would run back and forth and try to bat them out of the air. And he would get so exhausted, he would pant like a dog afterwards. And I'm like, "Dang, dude, you got a lot of energy." I really wonder if, because I gave him so much exercise, that's why he lived for so long. Maybe.

Elyse Wild (6:16)
Tell me what really changed about your life when you got him.

Ethan (6:20)
I can certainly say my life changed in regards to having him when I moved out of my brothers' house and on my own. Me and my partner had Bunko and another cat at this time, and we were just young people trying to survive on our own. I had a real wake-up call type experience when Bunko got himself into a pretty life-threatening crisis. He swallowed a sewing needle.

Elyse Wild (7:09)
Oh my God.

Ethan (7:10)
It had a little piece of string left on it, so I would assume he wanted to eat the string, and he ate the needle as well. And the crazy thing is, he had that thing in his throat for months, and we had no idea. We basically wake up one day to see him cowering in the corner. We're like, "Bunko, what's up, man?" We spin him around, and his neck had basically kind of exploded on itself because the infection was in there for so long.

This was the first time I realized that having a pet was not all fun and games, because me and my partner at the time did not have the money for this. That's a very strange surgery—very expensive surgery. It made me feel bad at the time, because I'm like, I love my cat, but where's the line? If I have to survive on my own, am I able to take care of a pet when something like this happens? Because, you know, I barely have enough money to pay rent and bills and stuff. I felt really down on myself because, for a moment there, I was like, "Well, I got to put him down." No question about it.

Thankfully, a buddy of mine said he would lend me the money. Yeah, he's a really, really good guy. And then I started to kind of reflect on my thought process. I should have just done that—I should have just asked, gotten my confidence up, and just asked somebody for help. I was this close to just putting him down because I felt like it was too much of a burden on my new adult life. And I felt really bad about that when that happened.

I finally stopped feeling guilty. I realized, you know what? I am a pet person, I guess. What I mean by that is, yeah, I do like animals more than certain people. And I want to do everything I can to keep my pet alive, because they give me that affection that, you know, nobody else can. And it's okay to not have certain relationships with people that aren't as strong as your pet. Some people might find that crazy, but...

Yeah, for instance, after Bunko's surgery, I was reflecting. My mom passed away when I was 21, and I didn't have the greatest relationship with her, and I felt indifferent. I felt indifferent at her funeral. And for the longest time, I was like, "Should I feel differently? Is it wrong for me to not feel anything really for my dead parent?" It's not Dead Parent Podcast, but, you know, I was thinking about that after Bunko's surgery. I would have been so much more devastated if I did end up putting Bunko down or him dying in surgery. I would have cried my eyes out for who knows how long. That was the time where I told myself and I realized it's okay to enjoy animals over people sometimes.

He was a very strong cat. He definitely, throughout his life, could have died many, many times over—not because we were bad parents or anything, but just the way animals operate. They do dumb stuff. But he always seemed to pull through and didn't even really care that much about or didn't seem to be affected by surgeries or UTIs and stuff like that. He had an issue for a while with those.

But then once he got older, he actually really, really loved drinking water. People tell me that's kind of abnormal for cats—cats don't get enough fluids. I think this started around COVID and being inside more than usual, cracking open drinks and stuff. He got the urge to lick the condensation off a can. He would do that every single time, every single opportunity. If he heard something opening, he was running to come lick it. And I feel like from then on, he just became such a hydro homie, you know, drinking water as much as possible. I don't think he ever had a UTI after that. I don't know what clicked in his little cat brain, but he was all about water all the time.

In his older age, he was fine around people. Obviously, back in the day, he was very skittish towards strangers and stuff, but he was a cuddly cat. More so like a bed cat. He wouldn't really jump on your lap in other situations. He was totally cool with being picked up and stuff. And after the surgery, he had such a cute meow. His throat was all screwed up, and it basically just totally changed his vocal cords, I guess. And he would meow, especially if he was bored or you were denying him entry into somewhere.

Bunko was a little freak, just a little goober. I really liked—the thing I like about Bunko, if I had to describe him, he was just strange. I felt like he did things that I've never seen any other cats do. He acted very, very human in a way. His personality was very endearing. I don't know—the way that he would respond to everyday activities that I would do, almost trying to be involved in the smallest things. It just made me really happy. Annoyed also, sometimes. But he was invasive, I guess I could say that. I don't think I ever got a proper full night's rest ever, because he liked to be a cave kitty. He liked to just claw at the covers until I let him under. He would either sleep with me or leave two minutes later, and the process would start all over again.

He was an invasive species, and I loved him for that. And I miss sitting in my chair playing PC games and cracking open a beer, and now I can't play. I have to pause because I know Bunko is going to jump on my desk and start licking my can and stuff. And it's like, "Dude, go away, stop." And it's like, yeah, I wouldn't mind having that again. You know, it's been four months.

Eventually got separated with my partner at the time. She took the other cat. I took Bunko. I was living the bachelor life in the apartment by myself for a while. I basically just put my bed in the living room and I gave Bunko the actual bedroom. It was a one-bedroom apartment, and my partner left, so I'm like, "I'd rather just have a big open space, so I'm going to make the living room my room," and then I put all Bunko's stuff in the bedroom. Me and my roommate and him, we had a pretty solid year. Yeah, it's been about a year together, just all chilling, just three single boys.

I thought it was going to be a pretty routine checkup. He wasn't drinking anymore. And of course, that was cause for concern, because of how much he loves it. So I took him to the ER, and I took him to my primary. They weren't exactly sure what was going on with him. He had some sort of blockage—not a UTI again, but something that was major constipation at first. We were just like, "Yeah, you know, we'll give him some laxatives and we'll keep an eye on him." And the ER basically said the same thing.

He, out of nowhere, had liver failure, and nobody saw that one coming. There wasn't really much I could do because he was already very senile and not really knowing what's going on. Also, at this point, I thought it was just still constipation and stuff. But yeah, he just wouldn't move very much. And I kind of figured maybe he was starting to go. So I had to make the decision to take him to a place and basically get one more opinion before putting him down.

They said, "Yeah, he's really weak, and if he's not drinking, he doesn't feel like drinking. It doesn't even register that drinking water is an option." Total mush brain. I feel like I knew for a while that he was breaking down, I guess you could say. He's an old man.

I kept spending money on vet bills, and I'm like, "You know, this is okay." I guess, because of how aloof I was in the past, I wanted to take him to the doctor as much as possible. So I guess, kind of in a way, I wasn't coming to terms with the fact that he could pass away any day, because I'm just like, "I have the money now. I'm going to get a bunch of different opinions and stuff." And I used to call him indestructible. In my head, I'm like, "Uncle Bunko can't die." Obviously that's silly, but...

I had a friend who works kind of like a vet tech, I suppose. She also recommended that it was time for Bunko to go. She set up a meeting for me to put him down. And they were like, "Yeah, it's a good thing you did. He's definitely suffering now." You couldn't see it under his black fur, but his skin was starting to yellow, so definite signs of liver failure.

Elyse Wild (22:34)
What was it like to live without him? And tell me about what you have around your environment or your house or wherever to honor him.

Ethan (22:42)
Well, I will say one nice little touch I did before he got cremated: I made sure to send him off with a deck of cards. So in the urn is his ashes and the ashes of a deck of cards. I didn't do anything too fancy. I got a stone urn. It's like a blue stone urn. It's very cool to the touch. It makes me think that if he were alive, he would lick it. Yeah, he would want to lick it.

I got a picture of him on my wall. I tried not to be super sentimental with objects, I guess. I'm very, very minimalist with my stuff and what's important to me. So he definitely lives on more so in memory and not so much in objects. But I guess you could say, every time I crack open a drink—which is often, you know, pops or beers and stuff—it's easy to remember him because of his little idiosyncrasies like that, that stuck almost to a fault. You know, he'd just be so annoying about it. I am so glad that he did.

Bunko was my first pet that I needed to take responsibility for. I don't want to say super stereotypical stuff, like he taught me how to be more sympathetic, empathetic, caring, but he did. I got better as a human being with the social interactions that I had around me, and I feel like I did well. It really did help to have this responsibility at a young age in a bizarre circumstance, I guess. It prepared me to be a good cat dad when I was on my own. I feel if and when the time is right to get a cat again, it'll just be like riding a bike, I guess.

But ultimately, I guess what Bunko taught me was it's okay to express your feelings in different ways. Maybe you think society has expectations for you in interpersonal relationships with other humans. I am happy, and I will own it. I am a cat person.

Elyse Wild (26:40)
In case that there is an afterlife—none of us fucking know—but if there is, and if you get to see Bunko again, what would you say to him? What would be the first thing that you would say to Bunko, if you get to see him again in whatever afterlife may or may not exist?

Ethan (27:01)
Are we assuming in this scenario that I can actually talk to him and he can talk back?

Elyse Wild
Yes.

Ethan
I personally don't believe in an afterlife. And you know, that's totally cool if I never see Bunko again. I don't need to. Yeah, I almost feel like it would ruin the legacy.

Elyse Wild (27:37)
It sounds like you guys had a good life together. Yeah?

Ethan (27:43)
We did, yeah. We really did.

Elyse Wild (27:53)
Thank you for listening. If you have a dead pet that you'd like to share, please send an email to deadpetsofficial@gmail.com. Dead Pets is a Wild Media Industries production. It is written and hosted by me, Elyse Wild. Our sound is edited by Brandon Hill. Original music is written, performed, and produced by Brandon Hill. Please remember to like and subscribe. For more information, please visit deadpetspodcast.com.

"Until one has loved an animal, one's soul remains unawakened." —Anatole France

Transcribed by https://otter.ai