Thank you, David, for your always lovely evocations. We lost a special dog
recently as well, so this was particularly heartfelt (from heart to heart,
eh?). If I weren't quite so far away, I'd thank you in person one day. Love
the chicken chatter.
Ursula
On Nov 22, 2015, at 1:46 PM, david ritchie <profdritchie@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:------------------------------------------------------------------
On his last day, I was awake at five. I came downstairs and lay on the
couch. He struggled over, groaned. The tumor on his shoulder was huge. I
put my hand down, scratched behind his ears. I tried the kind of
time-filling inconsequential words you summon while waiting for a plane, or
when someone is slow to come out of the operating theatre. “Remember when,”
is how that talk begins. “Remember when I nearly fell on the granite steps?
I was helping you round? That would have been a bad one. I should have
swept the leaves.” He relaxed, gave off a gentle snore. “You do know what a
great dog you’ve been?"
Mimo came up. "Haven’t seen the dog. Did he go on holiday?”
“We quite like him, you know,” Peccorino added. “Never a bother.”
Mimo had another idea, “Maybe he was promoted?”
Appenzeller pointed out that if you re-arrange the letters in “dog,” he could
be a god. Delighted with herself, she strutted about, as if she were the
first in the world to see this. “Did he join Senior Management?”
I couldn’t bring myself to say that Mac was dead. I shook my head and stared
up at the trees. There was no light on them. The day was dull and wet.
What on earth were we all doing standing out there in the rain? They
chattered on, apparently oblivious.
“We’ve noticed the cats seem discombobulated. We tried to ask them, but
they’re pretty hopeless generally…run off the minute you approach. You just
can’t chat with a cat.” Rocky tried singing the last seven words.
I said, “I’m going inside."
They tut-tutted at Rocky.
“Wrong note altogether,” said Mimo.
“In-sens-sitive,” said Pecorino.
I smiled. It’s funny when chickens tut-tut.
It occurred to me that they too were making time-filling inconsequential
conversation. Standing in the rain was their choice; they could have been
huddling under the table. “See an absence can be at least as important as a
presence,” said Appenzeller. "It reveals things about your environment.”
“Environment,” said Cheddar. It had been a long time since she’d echoed
anyone.
Rocky did her best, “An absence is the sort of thing you notice."
I finally summoned words to explain that Mac has passed on, gone to join
Wensleydale and the choir eternal. I gestured towads the fresh grave.
“IHe’s over there. You were already in bed when I brought him back from the
vet. You may have heard me digging in the dark. Well, not quite dark. Dark
enough for you to be a’bed."
“Well,” said Cheddar, “...that’s good.”
“No,” I said, “it’s not."
Mac was an artist. He would be very carful about finding the right spot, way
off in the bushes, exactly where he thought the doo would do its best work.
He was shy about his process, I would look up, survey the constellations,
give him privacy; he would be claiming terrain, often in the rain.
Anger is one among the stages of grief.
I think I may take up boxing.
There are tidy sums to be made.
I’ll get boxes at Costco.
Make a start.
David Ritchie,
Portland,
Oregon------------------------------------------------------------------
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