I'm not doing so well, though I'm better than I had been.

Roundabout June 15th or so, my cat Raka when missing. At first I wasn't thinking much of it, since she would frequently roam around the neighborhood (though she was mostly an indoor cat) so when the one or two days that she went missing started to turn into eight and nine days, I started to really get worried.

Raka was my baby. Ever since I came home from a trip to Japan in 2009, that cat has almost always been with me. I raised her from a kitten, gave her as much love and attention as I could (though some parts of me try and convince me she ran away because I didn't care for her enough), and as much as I joke about it with my family, it meant so much to me that's she'd bitch and yell at me if I ever left the house for more than a day or so. I loved her and she loved me, and right out from under me, she vanished.

I'd gone to as many people as I could around the neighborhood, asking if anyone had seen her and no one had, and even gave out my contact information in case someone did find her. Two weeks became three weeks and it was getting harder to not just break down in tears over her disappearance. Worse yet, I'd heard from some other neighbors in the surrounding houses that the hill we live in is frequented by coyotes this time of year.

I couldn't hold it back anymore and I broke down crying in my living room, right as my family was trying to pack for a vacation we were going to be leaving on that day.

I'm still in pain over it, the other night crying myself to sleep, and while the wound is still fresh, it's slowly healing.

I've picked up a new kitten, this one a boy by the name of Guztav. He has a doctor's appointment to get chipped and a checkup tomorrow, but he's been helping me heal.

While, realistically, I shouldn't hold out much hope, I will still hold onto the prayer that Raka comes home one day, but until then, please just keep me in your prayers so that I can finish my grieving and be able to get back to life with Gustav.