The small red collar with white dog bones printed on it felt
so empty in my hand. I did not
anticipate how easily it made me cry to drop it into the basin of soapy water
with the long leash. It reminded me of
everything my heart really wants to forget about last Wednesday.
Writers are supposed to pay attention to what their readers
ask for. My favorite reader remarked
that after reading “Losing Connery,” it brought a tear to her eye … and that
perhaps I should write happier things. With a wistful sense of resignation, I told
her I could only write what I knew. And
that, after all, is the writer’s #1 rule:
write what you know. So I reach
into my heart and pull out this new sorrow that has been graciously shared by
so many dear friends and family.
I wrote a sort of obituary for my beloved Bethany Darlin’
Pearl and posted it to Facebook. I did
write it that same night but had to sit a few hours with the newly rendered
grief in my heart to be able to make it sacred, to do her justice. The two dogs left behind with me, her
daughter Madeline Grace Pearl from her first litter and her grandson Valor
Prince of Morning Glory Acres, didn’t immediately seem to get it, that she had
not been dropped off at the groomers for a bath and cut like I had so many
times before. I returned from the
veterinary office with the collar and leash clutched in my trembling hand. My heart felt like one big bruise and I was
holding emotions that I could only “sit with” to be able to let them ripen so I
could understand them. My soul was
sitting shiva for my dog.
The facebook post said:
Tonight I said thank
you and goodbye to my precious Bethany Darlin’ Pearl who was such a great dog. So many of us have the gift of one of her
puppies in our lives. She was truly a
beautiful soul. She came from Arkansas
and was the first puppy I raised from 8 weeks.
So many great memories…. She had health issues at the end … I miss her
already. I hope I did good by her all
these 13 years …. The house isn’t the same without her following me from room
to room. May her legacy live on in her puppies
and grand pups.
So many, many people weighed in to express condolences. My appreciation for those comments is deep. At the time of this loss, it reminded me of
the question someone once raised at an adult Bible study about where dogs go to
when they die. I was surprised at the
calloused presumption behind the question and now I think I can tell them a
real answer. My initial response amidst
a grief so great would be that most dogs go where most humans have not earned a
right to enter either by faith, works, or even grace ... but I will call on a greater charity and
answer nicely.
I am not a philosopher.
I have NO idea how I passed Philosophy 101 because the professor, having
taught the class a hundred million times to those obliged by pre-requisite
standards to take it, had perfected the art of droning. No, I do not reference robotic flight. I mean the Original kind of droning, the kind
that puts listeners into a stupor without joy.
I believe I got a B- or a C in that class. He was boring. The book was boring. The class was boring. If there were a fee to be charged students
relative to the Boredom Scale, it would have been quite the sum.
As an adult 30 years later, I realize that the gravest of
injustices was done to the gift of Philosophy in that very class. Philosophy teaches you how to think about
life and its bigger questions. It also teaches
you how other people think about the same.
And hopefully in the process you are able to sort out the difference
between bull crap and rational processing of ideas. That in itself is a critical life skill. The word philosophy
means “love of wisdom.” Anyone who
does not love wisdom is, by implicit definition, a fool. The bible echoes that sentiment many times in
the Old Testament Hebrew Scriptures. I
am sure other religious traditions feel the same about the pre-eminence of
wisdom and the result when people spurn it.
St. Thomas Aquinas, the greatest Catholic philosopher ever, was
practically leagues-deep in the wisdom that comes from study, pondering and a
life of deep prayer. I want to share, in
my kindergarten level version of Aquinas’ thought, what I told the Bible study
people about what we could surmise about where dogs go. I turn to his writings on The Soul where he
says that since a soul is the spirit of life in a thing, that everything that
lives has “soul” in some sense. He
divided the kingdoms into: plant souls,
animal souls, and people souls.
I further posit that anything lovely, beautiful, and good
shares in those qualities because God in His Mercy extended them to that thing
or creature. Therefore, if there are roses
in heaven, they will be the most beautiful, fragrant, amazing roses ever –
beyond the imagination of the human, and honed to perfection by His
Majesty. If there are animals in heaven,
they have the disposition of the first animals before The Fall of creation …
they are peaceful, joyful, and reflect no evil or negligence that their
counterparts on earth may have suffered at the hands of mankind. (This is also my hope to greet two of my dogs
in Glory who will then be perfectly “house trained,” unlike their life on earth
with me.)
So how do I give hard data that this actually happens? How is it that this is not just pious,
dog-loving rambling pouring out of the dreams of my heart? This is how:
if what I believe about the destiny of people has been proven over time
through the returns of both saints and sinners, then what I believe about dogs
must be true by extension. I can tell of
the return of Jesus after death, or Catholic saints but those stories have been
told already by many, and perhaps better regaled than I could. I can tell the story from within my own family:
A week before my grandmother died, she was sleeping in bed
and woke up in the night. She poked my grandfather,
“Staszek, look. Babcia (her mother, my
great-grandmother) is standing at the foot of the bed.” My grandfather did not see her and told her
to go back to sleep. A week later, my
grandmother rose from bed in the middle of the night and tried to go down the
hallway to get a glass of water. She
collapsed in the hallway and passed away.
The Polish people have both legends and stories of those who
have come back to educate, warn, or make a way for someone. These things I believe without effort because
it is in my bones – not just my culture – to do so. Yet it has also been my experience that dogs
sometimes linger after their bodies give way.
My first dog that I adopted shortly after I graduated from
college lived about 20 years. She was a
part of everything that was great in my life – my first job out of college was in
youth ministry and she accompanied me on camping trips with the kids. When I taught high school, I brought her to
the lock-in to hang out with the kids also.
I promised her that I would soon get out of renting apartments and move
into a house with her. When I moved to
the Bridgeport house, I brought her with me, but her age and her health were
against us. Within a few short years, I
took her to the final veterinary visit because of her cancer, yet I was unable
to bring her home to be laid to rest until I got a hole dug at the house. That meant her body was at the clinic for 4
days. As I drove home without her, I
sensed her with me – everywhere – walking on the grass outside, lingering in
the kitchen, just being nearby somehow.
The following Saturday, I retrieved her body, gave her a proper burial
and returned to my routine. I could no
longer sense her around. Her tired frame
was laid to rest, and that is when her soul was free to go further.
Over two years ago, I laid to rest my lab mix Timbyr. I have no unusual stories to tell about that.
I awoke that morning to find she had a stroke and I knew what the right, but
always difficult, next-step for me the human, was. I told her as she passed who to look for, and
to expect macaroni and cheese. (Hey, your
idea of perfect heaven doesn’t have to be the same as hers!) Last Wednesday, when my Bethany Pearl was
passing, I had told her to go to Timbyr.
There was no feeling of her lingering at the clinic that afternoon. The vet didn’t need to tell me when she was
gone, I knew first because my hand was on her and I felt her soul dissipate
from her body. She is good now. But I am not.
As the days pass, the other two dogs stick with me loyally,
and I am aware that I am not worthy of this dedication. Also, I am not the most pleasant of company
since I sometimes struck with the grief again and can’t pull back from crying. My friends think I am great with dogs. But that is not entirely true. I love my dogs fiercely, but I do not always
put them first. I am not always aware of
their needs if I am too focused on other more demanding – or distracting -
things. More than once, Madeline has
flipped an empty dog dish down the cellar stairs to call attention to an important
thing I forgot to do. My heart is heavy
for the ways I wish I could give to them with the zeal and dedication that they
give to me. I am a flawed human being,
and while I chose each of them initially to be with me on this part of my journey,
I am ever grateful for their continued choosing to give love, joy and
fellowship to me so freely. Only a good,
very good, God could have made dogs for the likes of mankind. And it stands to reason if we, who behave at
times with such less dignity and grace than them, are destined for His eternal
company, then so too must they be destined.
You can, of course, choose to disagree with me. But you will be wrong. And some day, I’ve got at least five dogs who
are going to prove that to you. As for
me, perhaps they will share their mac & cheese with me.
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