Today, I miss Lady.
Well, I miss Lady every day but this morning I went to the closet to
pull out a scarf because it’s cold out and after I put it on, I immediately
noticed it had Lady’s hair on it. It hit
me like a train, she wasn’t here anymore, pretty soon I will stop seeing her
hair everywhere and I was immediately sorry for all the times I cursed my luck
at getting a dog that shed so much.
Tears ran down my face as I swore to myself, “if I could just have her
back, I wouldn’t care if she shed pounds of hair every day.” I see something of her every time I round the
corner in my house, in the car, at the park, driving down my street, sitting in
the back yard, watching TV on my bed.
She is in all these places because that is what we did together…. Everything. My interaction with Lady was more than any of
my friends and family including Charles.Our little conversations and
interactions both physical and emotional went on everyday for 17 years. I read a really good article by Joe Yonan at
The Washington Post, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/the-death-of-pet-can-hurt-as-much-as-the-loss-of-a-relative/2012/02/21/gIQALXTXcS_story.html
Here is an excerpt from the article that stuck with me,
“Over
the course of 13 years, for instance, the same thing would happen with Gromit
every morning. I would sit on my bed to put on my shoes, and he would drape
himself across my lap. I would scratch his butt and he would reward me with a
big sloppy kiss. Recently, I did the math: Accounting for the times I was
traveling without him, this interaction happened more than 4,000 times.”
I really identified with this thought. Lady and I had so many such rituals. After she was older, she had a bed in the
living room and beside my bed. She would
sleep in the living room and when I was ready to go to bed, I’d let her out and
brush my teeth while I waited for her.
When she came in, she knew it was time for her to go to her “real” bed,
the one beside mine. She never liked
sleeping with me. She would often start
the night off there but would invariably get up in the middle of the night and
move to her bed. This got harder for her
after she couldn’t see at night very well and would worry about jumping off the
bed. We did this every night. Even when we traveled, we took her with us
and she still had this nighttime ritual.
Nights are very hard.
Coming home and not seeing her little face in the window or waiting for
me at the door, dancing around and running for the back door to go out as soon
as she got the “nice to see you “ pats.
Charles will be out of town for two days next week and I’m dreading it
with a passion. I might go stay with my
daughter just to avoid it. I hate it
when Charles has to stay away from home but the one thing that made it better
was that I could spend unlimited silly time with Lady. We would take our dinner to bed and she would
lay with me all night. When he was gone,
she would usually stay on the bed all night.
Did she know I needed her?
When Harley died, it was really really hard but I had Lady
to help me get by…. We grieved for our friend together. With Lady now there is deadly quiet
everywhere I go.
I really recommend anyone going through this to read the
article by Joe Yonan.. it was a big help to me.
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