"CJ" (Image & Text Copyright Wylddane Productions, LLC)
Liam always said that CJ wasn’t so much a cat as he was a presence.
From the day he brought him home—an orange-and-cream Maine Coon with a ruff like a winter king and eyes the color of late-autumn sunlight—CJ chose him. Not the house. Not the furniture. Him.
The vet had been honest.
“There’s a heart murmur,” she said gently.
Liam nodded, already knowing the answer he would give.
“Then we’ll just love him harder.”
And so they did.
CJ grew into the house as if he had been there all along—claiming the bentwood chair by the lamp as his throne, keeping watch from beneath the Christmas tree, batting at ornaments with slow, deliberate curiosity, as though testing the physics of magic itself. He was a one-man cat, and Liam was his whole world.
In December, CJ became something else entirely.
He took to sitting beneath the tree in the early mornings, when the lights were still glowing and the world outside had not yet remembered itself. Liam would sometimes catch him staring—not at the ornaments, but through them, as if the colored glass and tinsel were windows to somewhere just beyond.
“See anything interesting?” Liam would ask.
CJ never answered.
But his tail would flick once—measured, knowing.
On the morning CJ left this world, the house was impossibly still. Snow pressed its silence against the windows. The fire had burned low. Liam held him close, whispering everything that mattered and nothing that needed explaining.
And in the final moment—just before that brave, tired heart gave out—CJ turned his head and buried his face against Liam’s neck, exactly where he belonged.
Some say animals don’t know when they are crossing.
Liam knew better.
That December, strange things began to happen.
The chair by the lamp creaked at odd hours, as though a great weight had just settled into it. Ornaments beneath the tree would sway without reason. Once—only once—Liam swore he felt a warm brush against his ankle while standing alone in the kitchen.
And every morning, without fail, the house felt watched over.
Not in a way that unsettled him.
In a way that comforted.
One dawn, as Pentatonix’s “Hallelujah” filled the room and the tree lights glowed like small, patient stars, Liam lifted his coffee mug—the one with CJ’s face on it—and whispered, “Good morning, old friend.”
The fire crackled.
The wind sighed outside.
And somewhere between memory and miracle, a golden-eyed watcher kept his post.
Love, Liam realized, does not disappear.
It simply learns how to stay.
* * * * * * * * * *
It is still dark outside this morning.
The windchill is sub-zero, the kind of cold that reminds you where you live—and why you choose it.
Inside the wee cottage, warmth gathers gently. The fire speaks in its soft, ancient language. The Christmas tree lights glow like kindness made visible. I cradle my CJ mug in both hands, feeling more than heat rise from it.
I miss him.
Deeply.
And yet—here he is.
In memory.
In presence.
In the quiet knowing that love shared so completely does not end—it transforms.
Pentatonix sings “Hallelujah,” and the sound feels like a benediction for the day. Just moments ago, I read Dr. Wayne Dyer’s words:
“Peace can be a lens through which we see the world. Be it. Live it. Radiate it out. Peace is an inside job.”
Ah yes.
Peace does not mean the absence of tears.
It means allowing them to fall without fear.
So I begin this day—with a tear in my eye, with gratitude in my heart, and with the quiet certainty that CJ’s love still walks beside me.
Wonderful moments upon which to build more wonderful moments.
So it is. 🕯️🐾
* * * * * * * * * *
"Love that is given without condition
does not end—it keeps watch."
~Wylddane
From the day he brought him home—an orange-and-cream Maine Coon with a ruff like a winter king and eyes the color of late-autumn sunlight—CJ chose him. Not the house. Not the furniture. Him.
The vet had been honest.
“There’s a heart murmur,” she said gently.
Liam nodded, already knowing the answer he would give.
“Then we’ll just love him harder.”
And so they did.
CJ grew into the house as if he had been there all along—claiming the bentwood chair by the lamp as his throne, keeping watch from beneath the Christmas tree, batting at ornaments with slow, deliberate curiosity, as though testing the physics of magic itself. He was a one-man cat, and Liam was his whole world.
In December, CJ became something else entirely.
He took to sitting beneath the tree in the early mornings, when the lights were still glowing and the world outside had not yet remembered itself. Liam would sometimes catch him staring—not at the ornaments, but through them, as if the colored glass and tinsel were windows to somewhere just beyond.
“See anything interesting?” Liam would ask.
CJ never answered.
But his tail would flick once—measured, knowing.
On the morning CJ left this world, the house was impossibly still. Snow pressed its silence against the windows. The fire had burned low. Liam held him close, whispering everything that mattered and nothing that needed explaining.
And in the final moment—just before that brave, tired heart gave out—CJ turned his head and buried his face against Liam’s neck, exactly where he belonged.
Some say animals don’t know when they are crossing.
Liam knew better.
That December, strange things began to happen.
The chair by the lamp creaked at odd hours, as though a great weight had just settled into it. Ornaments beneath the tree would sway without reason. Once—only once—Liam swore he felt a warm brush against his ankle while standing alone in the kitchen.
And every morning, without fail, the house felt watched over.
Not in a way that unsettled him.
In a way that comforted.
One dawn, as Pentatonix’s “Hallelujah” filled the room and the tree lights glowed like small, patient stars, Liam lifted his coffee mug—the one with CJ’s face on it—and whispered, “Good morning, old friend.”
The fire crackled.
The wind sighed outside.
And somewhere between memory and miracle, a golden-eyed watcher kept his post.
Love, Liam realized, does not disappear.
It simply learns how to stay.
* * * * * * * * * *
It is still dark outside this morning.
The windchill is sub-zero, the kind of cold that reminds you where you live—and why you choose it.
Inside the wee cottage, warmth gathers gently. The fire speaks in its soft, ancient language. The Christmas tree lights glow like kindness made visible. I cradle my CJ mug in both hands, feeling more than heat rise from it.
I miss him.
Deeply.
And yet—here he is.
In memory.
In presence.
In the quiet knowing that love shared so completely does not end—it transforms.
Pentatonix sings “Hallelujah,” and the sound feels like a benediction for the day. Just moments ago, I read Dr. Wayne Dyer’s words:
“Peace can be a lens through which we see the world. Be it. Live it. Radiate it out. Peace is an inside job.”
Ah yes.
Peace does not mean the absence of tears.
It means allowing them to fall without fear.
So I begin this day—with a tear in my eye, with gratitude in my heart, and with the quiet certainty that CJ’s love still walks beside me.
Wonderful moments upon which to build more wonderful moments.
So it is. 🕯️🐾
* * * * * * * * * *
"Love that is given without condition
does not end—it keeps watch."
~Wylddane
RSS Feed