Three Parts Joy, Two Parts Sadness.

Gypsy had her kittens last night -- three live, two dead. In my head I know it's better that the two died now, before I got attached to them, and that having three instead of five makes Gypsy's first litter much easier on her. But in my heart I feel sad for her that she lost two babies.

When I came home from my walk this morning, Gypsy greeted me in the driveway to show me she was no longer shaped like a football, then led me to her nest of kittens. She purred loudly as I peered into the box in the garage, letting me know she knew I wouldn't hurt them. Later, when I picked them up and took them in the house to show Mother, she just waited in the box, unconcerned, because she knew I'd bring them back.

Gypsy, technically, isn't even my cat. She's a stray that showed up starving at my house last fall a few days after a house up the street was destroyed by fire. She was barely old enough to be weaned then. Her brother, who I named Hobo, came with her, but never quite trusted me enough to even let me pet him. I imagined their mother had perished in the fire and began feeding them on my front porch every morning.

It didn't take Gypsy long to decide that I belonged to her. She would jump in my lap and demand to be petted any time I sat on the front porch. She's a rather small cat, hidden under her long brown fur. When she began showing obvious signs of pregnancy, I worried she might be too small to deliver. Growing up on a farm, you get to be realistic about baby animals. They don't always survive, and sometimes their mothers don't either. All you can do is hope for the best.

The last couple of days, she has been too uncomfortable to jump in my lap, so she just lay beside my chair, looking up at me with her big green eyes and letting out a soft "meow" every time she wanted me to reach down and pet her. I wondered if she remembered enough of her own mother to be a good mother to her kittens.

This morning, when I peered down and saw the five kittens -- three living, two dead -- all meticulously and lovingly cleaned, I knew I didn't have anything to worry about there. Gypsy loves her babies, even the ones who didn't make it.

I let her be with all her babies for a couple of hours, and when I came back later to dispose of the dead ones, I saw those two had been pushed just outside the nest, but deposited gently together. Don't tell me animals can't feel or don't understand death. These two were loved, and they deserved to have names just as her other babies would.

I picked them up and wrapped them together in the same strip of paper towels, grabbed a shovel and some flower seeds and buried them in the back yard near their uncle Hobo, who was hit by a car a couple of months ago. I scattered the flower seeds over the newly disturbed soil and named the two dead kittens -- Angel and Spirit.

The flowers? They were Baby's Breath. Angel and Spirit never had their first baby's breath when they were living. It was the least I could do to provide them with Baby's Breath in death. Sleep well, babies. I guess God needs kittens to play with too.