I found this account gathering dust in an old reader mail file:
Hi - I believe I'm writing to you about a ghost, though I'm not sure if the animal kingdom has an afterlife.
My big brother Gil is a long haul driver and regularly makes trips across the country. He'd be on the road for a couple weeks, then come home to Virginia and stop by to see our Mother who lives with me and my husband. I don't know how he does it, but he's always been a loner.
Last Summer, Gil said that he pulled into a truck stop in Indiana to get some food and rest. He's got a nice modern sleeper berth on board. He went to get something to eat, came back and there was a male black & white cat in the cabin. He wondered how it got in there. He was about to get rid of it, but then thought it may be lost because it had a new looking collar and was well taken care of. So he went back inside and asked around. Nobody was aware of a missing cat, so he wrote up a 'lost cat' flyer and posted it. He went back to the truck and the cat was asleep on the passenger seat. Gil had himself a hitchhiker.
From the beginning, the cat seemed a bit strange. For one thing, it would disappear and not show up for many hours. Gil would look all over the cabin and berth, but there was no cat. He assumed it found a hiding place.
Something else, the cat didn't eat anything Gil gave it. He never saw it drink water either. When they'd stop somewhere, the cat would just disappear again. Gil just figured it found a way out somehow.
One morning in Arizona, Gil woke and didn't see the cat anywhere. He waited around a bit, but he was on a schedule to make a delivery in Texas, so he had to get on the road. He felt bad that he was leaving without the cat, but that's the way it had to be.
He pulled into the delivery location in Texas that evening. He got out of the truck to talk to the guys at the dock, when he saw the cat walking around the truck. After that, he called the cat 'Casper.' He said that Casper acted like a ghost. He was getting ready to leave and head east, and Casper was asleep on the passenger seat.
A few days later, Gil came home. He stopped by the house to see our Mother and to get some dinner. We all sat at the table while Gil told us about Casper. He asked me if I could watch Casper for a few days before he headed back out on the road. I said fine, so Gil went to the back door and there sat Casper. It was like he knew that he was staying there.
For the 3 days Casper stayed with us, he never came into the house. I'd put food and water out for him, but he left it untouched. I figured he was catching mice or birds. I'd see him stretching out on the patio once in a while, but he'd never come in the door.
Gil called me and said that he was coming over to picked up Casper and head out onto the highway. Well, I couldn't find the cat. We all thought that Casper had found greener pastures and moved on. Gil left without his companion.
Later that week, Gil called me from California. He said that he guessed that Casper hadn't showed up at home. He started to laugh, because Casper was with him. In fact, he hadn't seen Casper until that day. He found him asleep on the passenger seat after grabbing a bite to eat.
A few hours later, Gil called to say that Casper was missing again. But he figured he'd show up sometime later. Well, that never happened. None of us have seen Casper since.
This past Spring, Gil was back at the Indiana truck stop where he had found Casper the previous Summer. The flyer he had posted was gone from the bulletin board. He sat down to order some food, later striking up a conversation with the waitress. He told her about Casper and that he had found him at that truck stop. She gave Gil an odd look, then she started to describe Casper to him including the collar. She said that the cat used to belong to the owner of the truck stop. The cat's name a 'Paco.' One day, Paco got into a fight with an unknown animal and was killed. She also said that Paco was buried in the small grove of trees beside the truck stop.
After eating, Gil walked over to the grove of trees. There was a small memorial for Paco. There all kinds of cat toys and other things left on the grave.
Gil called me that night and told me the story. It just seems to me that Paco was a companion to a lot of truck drivers. Gale
Animals and the Afterlife: True Stories of Our Best Friends' Journey Beyond Death
Animal Ghosts: Animal Hauntings and the Hereafter (Animal Ghost Stories)
There is Eternal Life for Animals
Toward the Light: Rescuing Spirits, Trapped Souls, and Earthbound Ghosts
