Sitting alone in my room, I realize that I will no longer be waking up to the greeting of my dog tomorrow morning. Not tomorrow... and never again.
Monday, the 16th of June 2008 - the day I decided to put my own dog to sleep.
How can I describe the emptiness I feel now? Truly, it feels horrible to know that I had the power to choose the death date of my own dog, the death date of a 17 year friend. Feeling that it was the right thing to do to put an end to her suffering from a leg infection (a product of my own negligence), I forced myself to be there when they injected a syringe of green 'elixir' into her right leg. I bet she saw it coming too...
Seeing the life force drain from her eyes was the worst thing to watch! There, I knew that I could do nothing more. I felt like Mother Mary in the Pieta. I forced myself to face death in the eye and learn the value of life, of love, of friendship, of deep loss.
Her Story:
Candy, my dog, appeared one day at my house door barking and running in circles. A stray, she came face to face with my dad and his unwelcoming umbrella. But all this changed when my brother suddenly mentioned that he had a dream - that our family had a new dog. Running out, my mom stopped my dad's hostile threats, and from that day onwards my family had a new member. Though skinny to the bone, infested with ticks and a sprained leg, we embraced every part of her. What was amazing was how we eventually found out that she had visited all our neighbours before she came to us - as if she knew she planned to get off the street for good and find a family. How human she was; and how IGNORANT and EGOISTIC are we to think and continuously justify that we humans are a distinguished aspect of creation! How sick are such thoughts, and the deeds these thoughts encourage!
I always joke with my friends that I have a mixed mongrel at home, a real bitch! An ironically affectionate term I adored Candy with.
Watching her leave my world on that table, I recall the phrase "love creates". Truly, when you really love someone, you invest in their existence and in turn their existence sustains you. You become happy to see that someone happy, and devastated when that someone is suffering without you. When that someone is lost, the living part of you that was created and belong to you both vanishes. It is this very creative characteristic of love that makes parting and death so painful. Candy's death has brought my experience with love to another level. How often do we fail to love people and all their ugliness and fragility; How often do we neglect the bodies we are given to share love through physical touch; And how often do we hurt the spirit that possess the power to love life and treasure every moment of it? How often have our self-pity and sloth prevented us from being who we were meant to be for others?
I will never forget this one special creation, the feeling of her in my arms while traveling to SPCA to parted forever, her ever grateful eyes, her smell, her brown fur and everything that she is. In a being others despise, I have found a friend who taught me the value of love and life. Now eternally lost, never to be replaced, but forever remembered and missed.
