BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (WIAT) — When Christy Eubank moved to Birmingham from Charlotte a few years back, the pandemic lockdown kept her from getting acquainted with the Magic City as quickly as she’d have liked.
But last summer, after Eubank had joined a social group and began getting out more, she finally met someone who truly made her feel at home in Birmingham — Tab, Parkside on Fifth’s resident cat.
Yesterday, less than a year after she’d first met Tab, Eubank and hundreds of other Birminghamians learned the sad news of his death.
“It is with a heavy heart that we inform you that our friend and ‘Birmingham’s Coolest Cat’ TAB has crossed over the rainbow bridge,” the Avondale bar posted on its social media accounts. “He was loved by so many.”
Eubank said the news was heartbreaking.
“I’m very sad,” she said Wednesday. “He’s just one of the magical things here in the Magic City.”
She said Parkside had been closed the first day she met Tab, but that she’d hung around with the friendly orange cat outside.
“Tab and I spent a lot of time together, having little private moments,” she explained. “He was so lovable and memorable.”
Each time she returned to Parkside — or even just walked by — she’d look for Tab, who was honored as the Animal League of Birmingham’s Coolest Cat in 2022.
“I was always looking for him,” she said. “Who wouldn’t? He’d become a Birmingham staple.”
Eubank, who works in finance but is a hobbyist belly dancer, said she’d just been thinking about Tab when she heard he’d died. She said she plans to bring some type of gift to Parkside just to remind those who cared for the friendly feline that he will be missed.
Parkside on Fifth, too, plans to memorialize Tab in some way, although plans aren’t yet set in stone.
“We are planning a memorial for him soon and we are going to put a plaque on his bench out front,” the bar’s post said.
Parkside on Fifth asked that those who knew Tab share their memories and photos to keep his legacy alive.
Eubank said she’ll always cherish her time with Tab.
“It was always ‘give love, get love,'” she said of Tab. “That’s what he did, and that’s what we should do, too.”