Letter from the Desert: Emerging

Our last newsletter was met with two paid readers ending their subscriptions prematurely. I am not sure whether there’s causality there.

Either way, if you’re inclined to bump your sub up from free to paid, I would be extremely appreciative.

I seem to be coming out of the depths.

It’s 40 days today since... that day. It seems far shorter. I can almost still feel the heat of her breath on the nape of my neck.

It’s a weird thing, you know? I was so careful not to make the mistakes I made with Zeke — primarily waiting too long to make that impossible decision — that I honestly cannot second-guess myself too much. She was done. Four days prior, she wasn’t. She did not linger for months, suffering through things. She had some pain for the couple years prior, but she was still utterly enthusiastic, leaping up for walks and treats and to get in the car.

Our time together seems so truncated, but in reality she was with me for 11 and a half years, starting at around age two. I do wish she had had more pleasant time where she could enjoy the fruits of our labors together, relaxing and hanging out with Jack and making more human friends. But 13 isn’t an unusual lifespan for pit bulls of her size.

I keep trying to make this sadness about something I could have done better, or at least differently. And none of those things bear scrutiny. It’s just your basic soul-searing loss. No tragedy here, except the usual thing about human’s lifespans being criminally longer than those of dogs.

So, I’m starting to be able to imagine a life without her physical presence. Her ashes are on my bedside table. There’s a sense of finality there that I did not quite get from sitting with her as she died.

I am still wrestling with the feeling that moving on is betrayal. It turns out that this is a very common thought process among bereaved people, whether they’re mourning a dog or a human. So much so that there’s a stock therapist question that’s asked of people in this sitch.

Therapist: So. If they were in the room with us right now, what do you think they would say about you worrying that being happy again would betray or dishonor them?

Me: My sense is that it would be something along the lines of “woof.”

Therapist: Did you just…

Jack has been faithful and diligent. He struggles to navigate this change in which I try to hug him or lean on him or lie on the floor next to him approximately seven times as much as I did before May. As a German Shepherd, he is constitutionally uncomfortable with the daily number of hugs pit bulls consider a bare minimum requirement.

But he does bring me toys to throw for him, which Heart never did once.

So. Look for more activity here than had been the case in the last two years, as tending to my aging dog slowly crowded out most other things.

And thanks to those of you who reached out over the last 40-plus days. I appreciate you.