lonely cat dies

So I was surprised to find out that my Grandmother's cat kept her from being lonely.  She lives with two of her children.  Another daughter and son in law live next door. Another two daughters live next door as well.  Down the street live another daughter, son in law and grandson.   Across the street even more live even more granddaughters and grandsons and so on and son on.  She has lived in this town all of her life and her parents before them. She is going on 80 years old, still drives and when she is "out on the town" she never meets a stranger.  She is known by someone everywhere from the church to the post office to the dairy queen.  At last count, there were more than 60 relatives I could name of of the top of my head while writing this paragraph. In fact, I am sitting in her house writing this right now and in the last 15 minutes, at 1130 am on a Sunday morning, at least 6 different people have come in and out of her house.  But, she had this cat.  This mean, awful, useless cat that scratched and hissed at everyone.  She named it Mercy.  She named it Mercy because when it was around all she could say was "Oh, Mercy".  We joked that it was called Mercy because it never showed anyone any.  Whatever the reason, that was it's name and it loved my grandmother.  It would sit on her lap and it was nice to her.  It died last week.  Today, I heard my aunt mention what my grandmother said about it.  Mercy kept her from being lonely.  Grandmas lonely?  When does she EVER have the chance to be lonely?  Everyday, my aunt said.  That was very curious to me. Currently, I am struggling with feeling a bit lonely myself.  This seems to be curious to the people around me as well.  How can someone like me be sad or lonely or depressed.  Well, if my grandmother can be lonely, so can I. Maybe that cat gave her an anecdote to her loneliness. Maybe it listened without judgement.  Maybe it never walked away while she was talking or was rude to her.  Maybe it was tough and tolerant enough to listen to her honest feelings as ling as she needed.  maybe it just gave her something to do.  For me, it seems my loneliness is caused by many things.  A little of each ingredient seems to make the perfect recipe for Lonely.  A craving for attention starts it off.   Then a pinch of dismissive behavior thrown my way.  Add an intolerance for my "strong emotions" and a healthy dose of labeling, "Drama Queen" or "Over Dramatic" would do fine.  Just the right amount of hormone in-balance makes the perfect breeding ground for "nobody loves me" and "nobody cares" disease.  Before you know it, I am lonely.  I am glad my cat didn't die.

"I know this. Death, life, angels, rulers, things happening now, things that will happen, high things, low things, nothing else in all the world can come between us and God's Love in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Romans 8:38-39