She was the best cat, and the worst cat; a constant feature in my life for 20 years.

It was probably 1992 when Misha brought the tiny black kitten home from a litter that my mom had. We named her Milou with a bit of irony; Milou is a French boy's name, which was the name of the comic book character Tintin's male white dog "Snowy" when translated into French.

At the time, I was living in a tiny house in Multnomah Village, where we already had Misha's cat Sukah. Milou was friendly and playful and Sukah - true to her name, 'bitch' in Russian - would have none of it. She absolutely despised the tiny Milou, and would hiss and swat at her whenever she was around. Mostly Sukah just moved outside to avoid her, and ceded the house to Milou. We kept Milou indoors - the only time I remember her going outside was when we had a yard sale. For that, we bought her a little harness, and tied her to the porch with a tiny white string. Later we got a ticket from the county because they saw the harness outside on the porch and deduced that we had an unlicensed cat.

When she was still a tiny kitten, she pounced on my twitching foot when I was asleep, and without really knowing what was going on, I instinctively kicked my foot and sent her flying across the room and hitting the wall. I felt bad, though she wasn't hurt, and she learned not to harass sleeping people.

I think it was less than a year before we moved to the Garden Home house, where she lived the next nine years of her life. Less than a week after moving into that house, Sukah got hit by a car and killed, and Milou became the queen kitty in the household, as she would remain for the rest of her life.

Not too long later - perhaps a few months - we went to the Humane Society and picked her out a friend, the sweet and fragile Vita, who was supposedly about the same age, perhaps a little more than a year. They became good friends and cuddle buddies. A couple years later, we introduced a new kitten, Muezza, and that messed up the relationship between Milou and Vita. Milou liked the kitten better (after an adjustment period, of course), so Vita got demoted to third cat.

Vita didn't like being third cat, and probably missed her place with Milou, so she would occasionally challenge her leadership. You could see it developing: wherever Milou was sitting, Vita would try to take over, would sit uncomfortably close, and try to weasel in. Milou was always very confident and gracious, so at first she would just give up the spot and go find another one. But Vita would follow to the next spot, and so it would continue, until Milou would get fed up and take a smack at Vita. The challenge would last for days, and they would hiss and growl and occasionally scrap. We never stopped them; unlike dogs, I don't think we can settle their differences. Eventually Milou would get Vita pinned down by the neck, Vita would howl like something from a horror movie, and Milou would make sure Vita understood her position in the house. Vita would respect that for a few months, but eventually challenge her again, and lose every time. Milou was tough, but gracious unless her authority was challenged.

Muezza never challenged Milou, not even once that we noticed. She could quite possibly have won; she was always healthy and strong. And she didn't lack aggression - she was constantly dominating Vita, and making sure her displeasure was known, though they never fought. To Milou she always showed deference. Milou and Muezza were always tight; they would cuddle together and lick each other's faces all the time. Milou would show affection to Vita too, but it was always a little dominating, like showing favors to a loyal subject. Milou would also smack Muezza around if she annoyed her for whatever reason; Muezza would hiss but never fight her - she knew her place and she would back down and just go away. But Milou and Muezza would always eat together peacefully from the same plate; Vita had to be fed away from the other two.

The nine years we lived at that house, the cats were never allowed outside. The incident with Sukah, who had survived wandering around in the city for many years, showed that the road was too close, too fast, too dangerous, too deadly. Occasionally Milou or Muezza would escape, and we would not rest until they were captured. They looked out the windows a lot, and chuffed at the birds. None of them had ever really been outside,so they got somewhat used to the idea, though they would still try to escape if any opportunity presented itself.

Milou's favorite place to sit was on top of my monitor in my office and music room in the back of the house, facing out into the back yard. Monitors back then (the 90's) were heavy cathode-ray-tube affairs, with a lovely warm vent on the top, perfect for a cat to sit on. And my computer was placed against the window so I could see out, which meant that she could too. The only problem was that in such a position, her tail extended right down the middle of the monitor - right in my way. We dealt with that situation for a long time; I would tuck her tail up under her, or off to the side, but it wouldn't stay there for long. Sometimes she would meow at me, and always put her tail back down, right in the middle of the monitor. Eventually I had to stack some books up there just so that I could use the computer.

Milou was the best cat back then. She was always the most active and curious, always getting up on the counters and the couch. She loved the kitty toys that were a feather on a string, and would chase them as much as you would dangle them for her. If there was a lap, she would be the first on it. Unlike either of the other cats, she was confident around strangers and always a part of the household activities.

She never liked being picked up. I would grab her every once in a while and try to get her used to it, petting and scratching her very enthusiastically, but she would complain verbally and try very hard to scramble away. Sometimes she would even purr, but still yell and escape.

She was usually good, as much as cats can be. She nearly always used the catboxes back in the spare bathroom - except if it got really dirty. She knew it was Misha's job to clean them, and Misha would often let them get into a woeful state. If they got sufficiently filthy, Milou would pee on something of Misha's, like her shoes, usually right in front of her.

Milou peed on my stuff, as I recall, only twice. Once was right when we got Muezza as a kitten, and Milou wasn't happy about it. It happened that the same day, I bought a new CD, and listened to it in its entirety, reading over the booklet the whole time. Then I left and went somewhere else, and she piddled on the booklet, I think just to express her displeasure with this development. The other time was on a box of wires and electronic junk; not sure what reason could have existed that time; maybe she was mad at me for some reason.

Also around that time Molly came to live with us. She was a little dog, but very active. She tried to chase the cats, not out of aggression but just for a game, but Milou would have none of it. She'd slap Molly around if necessary. Molly took her sport in chasing Vita, since she would run away.

In later times, Milou seemed to really dislike Misha. I don't think Misha understood cat social cues very well - she was always grabbing them in odd ways and petting them in ways they didn't like. Plus there was the disagreement on the catboxes. If Misha bent down to get something out of a low drawer in the kitchen, Milou would jump up on her back and dig in her claws so that Misha could't stand up. Misha would yell for me to come and rescue her, and I could swear Milou was grinning.

A few other cats came and went. We had a couple kittens, Satch and Pepin, but we gave Satch away and Misha took Pepin when she moved out. Later I fostered a girlfriends cats for a number of months, and they lived in a parallel universe from my cats, generally ignoring each other. I rented a room to my friend Scott, and his cat joined the household, but again, didn't interact very much with my group. For a number of years, it was us five; Milou, Muezza, Vita, Molly, and myself.

In 2000 I graduated from college and soon after, started shopping for a new house. One of my main considerations was that it would a good place for the cats to go outside. By that time they were all well into their middle years, 10 years old or so, and had always been indoors. I thought their lives would be enriched by some outdoor time, even if it carried with it a little risk.

I bought the house on Miles Court, with a securely fenced back yard and a doggie door, so they could go outside whenever they wanted. I hoped that they would even prefer to use the yard instead of the catboxes.

I had been pretty frustrated with the cats, especially Milou, wandering around on the countertops, so when I moved into the new house I put sticky paper on the counters, having heard that they would learn to avoid that sticky stuff. They did learn, but unlearned pretty quickly after I removed the paper in a week or so. They were pretty smart, especially Milou. I didn't like them on the countertops but apparently there wasn't anything I could do about it.

Each of the cats established their territory in the new place. Milou took most of the house - well, whatever she wanted, she was queen and it was all hers. She lived in the central part of the house, mainly. Vita lived on the bed, and claimed that territory, though being the bottom of the pack, she wouldn't defend it if the others wanted to share. Muezza usually wouldn't, but Milou often would. Vita would clear a spot for her. Muezza took the back deck and back yard. Milou took the front yard.

She spent a lot of time in the front yard in those years. She loved to sit under the Japanese Maple and watch people walk past in the afternoons. Often she would go across the street and sit under those neighbors' bushes, and it made me nervous to see her crossing the road, though I had intentionally chosen a peaceful and slow neighborhood street.

But, a big problem was brewing, though it took me a long time to realize it. When we first moved in, I had a spare bedroom with nothing in it, so I put the catboxes in there. After a while it smelled, so I cleaned the catboxes, and it still smelled... I scrubbed them some more, it still smelled. Finally I got out a black light, and discovered that there was pee everywhere in the carpet. They had been using the whole room.

I moved the catboxes out of there and cleaned up the room, and thought I had it solved. But after a while the downstairs hallway started to smell. And later the dining room. It took a long time to notice, because the carpets and pads absorbed a lot. But gradually it became clear that Milou was picking her own places to pee, and nowhere with carpets was off-limits. Carpets were everywhere except the kitchen, so it was a losing battle. My theory was that she had lived on the hardwood floors at the other house for so long, of course you wouldn't pee on hardwood, you'd splash all over yourself. Now it would just disappear into the carpet, with nobody the wiser. What a neat trick!

But she didn't choose just anywhere. She never peed in the living room or bedroom. She would always choose somewhere that it appeared nobody was using. Eventually I sort of ceded the dining room to her; I didn't use it, and I was afraid that if I blocked it off she would choose somewhere worse. It was a difficult situation.

She especially wanted to pee in my studio downstairs. I mean, it was her goal and her purpose, and if she could ever find her way in there she was immediately looking to mark her territory. I don't know why, exactly, but I suspect it related to the smell of Scott's cat who lived in the next room.

Many people said that I should just have her 'put down' then, but I refused, figuring that nature would take care of it soon enough. She was already sick; she had some inflammatory bowel problem that had almost killed her several times. One time she felt so bad, she crawled under a bush outside to die, and I couldn't find her in the dark. I was supposed to go with my mom, aunt, and grandmother to the beach the next day, and I rescheduled with them so that I could look for her. In the light, it didn't take me long to find her, and I had to force-feed her for a couple days and give her appetite stimulants until she started eating again.

She also had pretty bad arthritis. She could no longer jump up on the counters, could barely even get up on the coffee table. She didn't understand it very well, so sometimes she would jump and miss, and slink away very embarrassed.

But in most ways she was the best cat ever. She was totally engaging and friendly to everybody. If I laid down for a nap on the couch, she was on my chest before I could even get settled in. If I watched TV or a movie, she was always on my lap. She followed me around the kitchen and meowed for meat or cheese or salty chips. She had a pink flamingo with feathers and bells hanging from elastic on a doorknob, and I would often hear her playing with it even when I wasn't available.

She was especially pestilent when I was trying to use the computer. She would climb up and stomp all over the keyboard, bump my hand on the mouse, get in the way of the monitor, everything she could possibly do to prevent me from getting anything done. I would put her on my lap and pet her, trying to get her to stay there, but as soon as I reached for the keyboard or mouse she would squirm up and get in the way again. Sometimes she'd nest herself into the junk on the desk for a while - not to sleep, just to watch me. For all the trouble, it was still sort of endearing.

One time I was working at the computer, on some task that I really wanted to get done, we were doing the usual fight for who was in charge, and she suddenly jumped down and went to the corner and peed on the carpet, right in front of me, asserting that this was indeed her territory and I should respect her. I grabbed her and threw her a little harder than I intended, and she hit the wall pretty hard. After that she accepted that the office was my territory, and wouldn't even go in there for a few months. Later we would go back to our previous battle for control of the computer.

In summer of 2011 she was diagnosed as having about 12% kidney function, so it was clear that the end was drawing near. I put them on low-salt kidney-diet food, but they didn't like it, and they barfed a lot, so I put them back on regular food.

Late in that summer I broke my foot, so I ended up with a lot of time at home on the couch, and she loved every minute of it. I hadn't spent much time in my living room, and when I was first interned there I realized that she had expanded her catbox to include several corners of it, so I paid my friend Mark $1000 to pull out the carpets and put down linoleum just so I could bear to be in there. It worked fairly well, though I was still always soaking up her puddles.

But knowing she didn't have long for this world, even after my foot was healed, I made sure to spend a little quality time with her each day, usually just sitting on the couch watching TV or reading a book for the last hour of the day. She was definitely happy about that; she never missed a minute of sitting on the couch.

The end came pretty quickly, if not unexpectedly. I think Friday I noticed her being sluggish; by Saturday she was barely able to stand, and I watched her stagger over to the water bowl for a drink, but then flop down right there and rest for a long while before trying to drink again. By night, she could hardly move. She didn't try to crawl away to die like cats usually do; she just rested in her favorite spot, where I had put a kitty bed in the kitchen in front of the heater vent. I picked her up and put her on my lap on the couch, which would normally have been her favorite place to be, but it was apparent that she wasn't comfortable there, so I put her back in front of the vent.

I made myself a bed on the kitchen floor and stayed with her all night, dozing intermittently, and petting her and talking to her, just telling her to rest. Four times during the night she let out a plaintive meow, but she didn't seem to be in too much discomfort. Shortly after 7am, she made one final stretch and she was gone; I knew exactly when it happened.

I got up and got a beer out of the fridge, and buried her under the Japanese maple in the front yard, where she spent so much time in happier days. That was November 18, 2012. She was almost certainly at least 20 years old. She had a good life for a cat.