Pitta our calico sweetheart, it was just a subtle measure of our love that we journeyed to the Rainbow Bridge in Utah to honor your memory. A Soul so precious to us, our fuzzy treasure. You are my Sunshine, for eternity. And as with Vata, we loved you since forever.
Your mere presence made any space perfect. You were our little doll. Your soft fur as white as snow, your fuzzy calico checker butt, your striking colors mixed in with the cutest little face and black nose tip. You made every van trip precious, we still had you and were so incredibly grateful for 2 1/2 more years with you, after Vata went off on his rainbow bridge adventure.
Van Life With a Little Heart Missing
Van Life changed, for the months on hospice. I couldn’t bring myself to post or think sprinterfam.com. Not with the same joy and inspiration. The last few van trips we took were about creating memories of Pitta’s last van adventures. We finished it off at Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, auspiciously with a powerful statue of a feline placed at the entrance. I thought the Canyon of the Ancients radiates a timelessness. Like our Souls, Love, and the Divine All that we inevitably merge back into.
We knew Van Life would never be the same without Vata. Now, without Pitta, it is a warmth absent beyond measure. So I write this as a tribute to Pitta, as she crossed the rainbow bridge in January 2024.
The Rainbow Bridge
We went to the Rainbow Bridge National Monument on April 2, 2024 to honor her life. We also went because it happened to be her and Vata Man’s earth birthday. We sat across the Rainbow Bridge for celebration in nature of a little Soul’s life well lived. We shared years and years of memories, the end realization is that it all truly fades to a dream.
Since 2018, we have and will always have endless memories of our best van cats ever, in the van. Their paw prints cover every inch in the van and leave an imprint for as long as we will live.
Van Life was the Best Life
Life is so drastically different than it was a few years ago. Van Life with kids and pets, our three pets. Now we have only one. Pitta and Vata, our angels with fur, are pure Soul now. Vata was our Tuxedo best buddy in the world. Pitta was our Calico sweetheart. We know Vata came to take Pitta home. He showed us he was there. Now they are Home, a place unknown through the human brain filters of this solid reality.
Their love, stories, and pictures fill our van, but it is not the same as their sparks of light we could see. All the places we’ve lived, with you, they now become something different. Something that can’t be cuddled, a love that is eternal without any sensory proof. Only a sort of trust that transcends the mind and can only truly live in the heart.
Our Calico sweetheart, Pitta, we had for over 17 years, it’s hard to imagine life before she and her tuxedo brother, Vata, came into it and made it whole. We’d never known parenthood without them, we’d never known Van Life without them. I’d never want to go on a van adventure without them, but we must now, there is no choice. They are our guardian angels now in Soul form. I’d do it over and over again.
Van Life was the Best Life because we had you in it. We made it through so many unintended changes and upheavals, now I see in retrospect, with our beloved cats carrying us through. That we had each other was the whole deal. The whole point.
Crossing the Rainbow Bridge
Pitta, when we sent you over the rainbow bridge to Vata, it was only a little less painful because we knew you’d be together again. If I truly believe that the veil that separates us is only in human conditioning, and that where Vata was is Source, Heaven, Paradise, Magic … well then there was no reason to hold on into suffering. I did not fear the end for her. It was the beginning of uniting with Vata again. All we get to hold onto now is our memories.
Oh so many memories. Vata, the family Alpha, always dressed in his finest tuxedo, our escape artist. Pitta, our little dolly, her calico colors mixed with fur as white as snow, contentedly staying close to her cozy van home. Pitta, you carried me through after Vata went Home over the Rainbow Bridge, I think you were supposed to. It was in the stars for you to stay with us, 2 1/2 more years.
With Us Through It All and for Eternity
Pitta’s last 2 1/2 years were living with us off-grid, as we built a tiny home. Moving with us from Oregon, to Mount Shasta, to Reno, and finally home to Utah. You made it to Utah with us and stayed with us six more seasons. But we never wanted to let you go. Truer words could not be spoken, “Death will come, always out of season” – Big Elk, Omaha Chief.
Pitta, our little calico hider, who went into a dilapidated wall and utterly terrified us as we thought you would fall into the framing. Pitta, who proudly hunted mice for us in our Mt Shasta tiny cabin. Pitta, who decided to wander off, meowing, into the dark milky way night sky at a dispersed camping site. Pitta, who jumped out of our van window in the middle of the night, to our surprise, and relief, as she didn’t disappear into the white fur forest.
Pitta, who frequently got her snow white paws covered in powdered dirt and then had to work diligently, by licking, to get them back to snow white perfect. Pitta, who made anyone who she would cuddle with, even just for a few minutes, feel so lucky. Pitta who was a sweetheart until the very last day.
Timeless
I could not imagine how fast 17 years could go. Then, just like that, the chapter ends even when it seems impossible to continue the story without them. All our hearts will reunite at the Rainbow Bridge. It seems human time has to be inadequate now. The only thing that will suffice is to know that every memory we made with Van Life will exists in a Pure Love fractal reality beyond Time.
You are my sunshine, halfway to a rainbow. We will never forget the years of Van Life with cats. Their paw prints, pictures and memories will be held inside for as long as the van exists in this physical word. Someday the van will be bygone, rusted and windswept, growing wildflowers on the mountain.
But holding Love that is Eternity.
