Jasper and Merlin

Jasper and Merlin

Jasper and Merlin came into our lives on May 24 2003. They disappeared without trace exactly one year and one month later. This page is a tribute to the memory of two very beautiful, much loved cats.

Merlin

Merlin and Jasper were two of a litter of three kittens born to our little tabby cat, Kitty. We never intended to keep any of them. We already had four cats. We had thought that Kitty wouldn't get pregnant because she was so tiny. When she did, our plan was to find homes for them when they were old enough to leave their mother.

Our plans were foiled when a different member of the family fell in love with each kitten . It was obvious by the time they were a few weeks old that we were keeping them, all of them.

Even at that age they each were developing their own little characters. Jasper was the nervous one who loved to be cuddled and have his long, silky fur stroked. Merlin was the wild one, who bit you when you groomed his long fur. Domino, The third member of the trio, and the only one who is still with us, was laid back and independent.

Jasper

We nearly lost Jasper twice in those early weeks. When he was just a few days old he disappeared out of the kittens' box and we found him under my son's bed. How long he had been there we didn't know, but he was very still. He soon picked up, however, when we put him back with his mother, brother and sister.

Then when he was ten weeks old he tried to take food from the dog's bowl and the dog bit him. It wasn't a bad bite. It damaged his eye a little and hurt his throat. The eye recovered but he never meowed louder than a tiny squeak. We don't know if his voice was damaged by the bite or if he would have been that way anyway. It certainly affected him psychologically. He just lay in his basket for days and my son had to coax him to eat. That was when his relationship with my son began. From the time he recovered he was my son's cat.

The summer of 2003 was a beautiful one. I spent long sunny afternoons in the garden with the kittens running around my feet. As they got older they wandered farther afield. Merlin became a wanderer quite early on. he would disappear for hours and then suddenly leap through the living room window onto my lap as I was watching TV. Jasper stayed near home. Often he would sleep through the day. The evening was his outdoor time. He loved to follow me around the garden as I watered the plants and would slip through the hole in fence to climb next door's apple tree. Domino's speciality was digging up the bulbs after I had planted them!

My name is Sylvia Ashton. I live in South Herefordshire with my husband and three grown up children, the cats and our half labrador dog.

The photos on this site with two exceptions were taken by my son Chris, who loves all cats, but to whom Jasper was extra special.