This is a bad day.

One of the bad things about living one's life somewhere between Hank Rearden and Mr. Spock, by which I mean rationally and setting aside emotions as irrelevant, is that when something DOES cause the emotions to break through, either because of one big bad event or an accumulation of smaller ones, the floodgates open and I don't have the tools to cope with them or put them in perspective.

Smoky, one of my two cats, is at this moment either dead or so near it that there's no coming back.

I found her last night in her box on the front porch, unresponsive. I pulled her out and lay her on the floor of the porch. Her eyes stared, unblinking, into nothing.

Sometime during the night, she somehow summoned the strength to pull herself back into her box. I could tell by her position that she could not move her back legs.

I don't know what happened to her. My best guess is that she got hit by a car, although there's no blood.

I really think I would be able to handle my emotions better if she had been dead this morning when I checked on her. I had used most of the night mentally preparing to bury her first thing in the morning.

But she was still clinging to life. At least, she was still warm and her muscles were slightly spasming.

Even then, I thought I had a handle on it.

But in the shower, my feelings overwhelmed me and I sobbed uncontrollably.

I keep telling myself that she was only a cat. And that I knew she would die someday.

But the more I try to contain myself, the worse it gets.

It is raining.