A Hello and a Goodbye

I had a blog entry all planned out for today. I was going to write about how the last month or so has been so full to the brim with travel, work, more travel, more work, a little art, a little writing, and a few other new leaves I'm straining to turn over. I had planned to write that entry this very evening, my first Monday evening in a while that was not already pre-planned with all the things I mentioned above.

I'll still write that entry someday, but it won't be today. Today, I'm still trying to make sense of the most senseless, most evil, most unacceptable thing.

Murder.

Today I found out a family member was murdered.

It wasn't an accident, or a sudden illness, or any of the other things that can take the life of a person in her prime. A person stood in front of her and purposefully, willfully ended her life.

She was relatively close on the family tree, but after we both moved in different directions, I had lost touch with her since I was a kid. We had recently reconnected on Facebook, and I was happy to see how well her life was going. She had her family, she had her business, she had her friends. I thought, as I "liked' her photos, as I left little empty comments of "Cute!" or, "That's awesome!" on her pictures, that I should reach out and start a conversation. I thought that as recently as this past weekend.

There was no reason not to, except maybe a little shyness on my part. There was no real barrier to reconnecting with her or a dozen other family members except someone starting the conversation. I figured I would get around to it eventually, maybe around Christmas, or some big event I could use as an opener. I figured there was time.

I never figured someone would kill her.

I'm going to say the same thing I'm sure you've heard over and over from anyone who has recently lost someone. It isn't any less true when you aren't stinging with grief, but human beings have a remarkable capability to numb themselves. Here's the inspiration for your Monday: whomever that person is you've been meaning to reach out to, do it. Do it now. Don't wait for a reason, don't wait for them to make the move. If you're thinking of someone and you care about them at all, if you see their pictures on social media and you wish you could talk over old times, do it. Now.

I'm grateful to the family member who remembered me, a thread hanging by myself apart from the rest of the seam, and told me so I wouldn't find out on Facebook.

I'm grateful to feel how much that meant to me.

I just wish I would have said "Hello," before I had to say, "Goodbye."

*If you or you believe someone you care about may be experiencing domestic violence, don't wait. It IS your business. You can find help at the National Domestic Violence Hotline, 1-800-799-SAFE (7233).

Inspiration Monday: The Last Night

As I passed by on my nightly walk, he stood in front of his house and leaned on his cane. His thick white hair and beard made him easy to see in the anemic light of the streetlamp. He waved like always. I paused my music as I waved back, just in case he decided to speak. He didn't always, but when he did, he liked to talk for a long time.

I met him about a year ago. I had been on a walk then, too. The neighborhood geese had lined up in the street in front of his house, blocking my path like an army battalion. He had ambled over beside me, shaking his head at them. I paused my music and we chatted while watching the teenage geese waddle stubbornly behind their parents. He didn't mind the geese, he said, as long as they stayed out of his yard. They scared his squirrels away when they came on his property, and that was a problem.

He told me about the squirrels, how he liked to sit on his back porch and watch them run in his trees, fueled up from his feeders. They never chewed on his roof like they did mine. He said it was because he gave them a home of their own and made sure they always had enough to eat. They respected him, he said. They communicated.

Partly because I was simply too shy to end the conversation, partly because I could see how lonely he was, and partly because he was simply a kind, interesting person, I stood there and stood there while he talked. He told me about his good wife who had died and left him alone a few years back. When it happened, he hadn't known how to cook or where the checkbook was. She was the best part of him, he said, and that was harder to find again than the checkbook. He told me about his son who was smart and stubborn and didn't come around anymore. He smiled and told me about his youngest daughter who used to live close and was his rock, but she had her own family now and left him missing her more often than not. He had Sally though, his little rat terrier who had slept between him and his wife, and who never chased his friendly squirrels.

We never had a conversation quite like that again, though he never failed to wave to me on my walks. I always waved back and paused my music, just in case. Sometimes he would chit-chat about the goings on of the neighborhood, but my restless feet kept me from standing there like the first time. Still, I kept my eye out for when his daughter's SUV would show up in his driveway and I'd smile, knowing he was enjoying her visit. I would sometimes pet Sally as she ran around in the yard, never setting more than a foot in the road. I grinned when I saw squirrels scurrying through his trees and hoped the geese wouldn't bother them. That was it, though. Waves, smiles, and a few kind thoughts to interrupt my own worries.

Last night, while he leaned on his cane under the glow of the streetlight, he waved me over to him. "Come see Sally," he told me. "This is her last night."

We both looked down at the little black and white terrier, and she wagged her tail. He told me about how it was, with her pancreas not working anymore. "She's sick, but she doesn't want me to know it. It's in her eyes, though," he said. "I can tell she knows she's sick by the way she looks at me." He told me she had never suffered a day in her eleven years, except for missing his wife when she died. He told me how they had saved her from going to the pound as a tiny puppy by scrounging up $50 to give a woman who couldn't afford to keep her. "It was meant to be," he said.

The little dog came to my hand and licked my fingertips. I saw what he meant about her eyes, but she wagged her tail anyway. I told him I was so sorry, but it felt hollow. Then I told him about losing Bella, and how I hadn't known her last night was her last. I told him I was glad for the weather, for the both of them. I didn't know what else to say. I still don't know what I should have said.

A car came by and I moved to the other side of the street. I called to him that I would pray for him and I would think of him and Sally the next day. "Come say goodbye to Sally one more time before you go," he said, beckoning me back to his side of the street. "She needs to say goodbye to all her friends." It wasn't until that last sentence that his voice ever cracked.

Bella, my copilot

I didn't expect that. I didn't expect anything when I went out for my walk, except maybe some shin splints and a little bit of a backache at the end of things. The rest of my walk back to my house, I thought about how many nights pass me by that mean so little to me but may change the world for someone else. I thought of Bella again, and how I couldn't decide if it would have been better or worse to know her last night was her last. I thought of my new puppy Ally, waiting at home for me, still recovering from surgery and craving all the comfort I could give her.

That conversation definitely changed my night. It got me thinking about the blessing and curse of a last night, of knowing it. I still don't know if I was given a choice if I would trade the bliss of ignorance for the dread of dawn. I don't want to think about choices like that, but sometimes I may need to. I do know I'm glad I got to say goodbye to sweet Sally on her last night.

My neighbor will be on my mind. I don't know him well, but how well do you have to know someone before you can care about them? He's gone through so many last nights in his life, and I know that someday I will walk by his house and pause my music to wonder where he is. I probably won't know that the last time I wave to him will be the last. Probably neither will he.

If you're ever struggling to figure out what's important, either in your life or your creative endeavors, think about The Last Night. Think about what you (or a character) would do if you knew it, and think about what you would miss if you didn't know it. Think about what piddling worries would leak out your ear, and how much more you would appreciate the simple blessing of a clear night kissed with a warm spring breeze.

The Invincibility of Grief (and the Inevitable Ache of Regrowth)

I have been planning to write this post for a while, but I haven't gotten around to it. I'm not sure what I was waiting for. Maybe it wasn't ripe yet. Maybe I thought it was, but I needed another week on the vine to figure out what it is I want to say. 

I mentioned in my last post that we suddenly lost our beloved dog, Bella, in a tragic accident. What I didn't mention was what went along with her when she died.

She may have been a dog to everyone else, but she was my role model. There were so many things I was still learning from her:

To greet every person with an open heart and wagging tail.

To be quick to apologize, sincerely, with wide liquid eyes.

To show my joy, unabashedly, until it catches fire like a shared candle.

To pick out the saddest person in a room and offer them quiet, gentle kindness to soothe their hurt places until they are strong enough for a game of tug. 

I loved that dog so much more than I realized.  After she was gone, I saw her everywhere. I found little bits of her hair in my purse from where she used to like to lie down on top of it. Her toys were hidden all over the place--couch cushions, under the bed, in my shoes. When I was drifting off to sleep, I thought I heard her sigh like she used to when she was dreaming. I heard keys jingle and thought instantly of her collar. I saw her profile in the shower tiles.

Sadness and remembrance attacked me like that over and over, like life was suddenly a minefield. They blew me up again and again, and the grief made me invincible. I was not afraid of anything. Nothing can break a heart already broken. That is, of course, unless I allowed it to grow itself back together. I wasn't sure I wanted to.

Grief may have made me feel invincible, but the potential for opening my heart to anything new made me feel vulnerable. In that tender state of hurt, the pernicious half-life that is bereavement made me believe it was safety, and in the only avenue toward growth--healing, love--I saw only potential for failure, guilt, and inevitable pain. I was more aware than ever how many tendrils my heart had sprouted over the years, and I knew so intimately in that dark place the searing pain of having one of them cut off without my permission. 

Then came Ally.

My sister found her. She was a rescue pup, and she looked so much like Bella. "It was just meant to be," she said when she brought her in the door.  It did not take long until we had to agree. We had a terrible time naming her, but a good friend suggested "Althea," Ally for short. It means "healer," and that is exactly what she is.

She is a lot of other things as well. She is a terror when she is in a chewing mood. When she whines to go outside in the middle of the night, she chirps like a sad, annoyed bird. She falls asleep anytime, anywhere...except when you want her to.

 

In other words, she's a perfect puppy in every way, and Husband and I both think Bella would agree.

I miss my dog. I still love her. I love Ally too, but not as a replacement--an addition. I think the difference for Ally is that I realized through losing Bella just how much love I have to give her, and how much pain I am willing to endure to offer it to her.

I am willing, and it is worth it.

Last week, a client gave me some news that settled at the bottom of my heart like a handful of wet sand. There is grief in her future, and because I care about her, in mine. I heard her loud and clear when she told me how the grief makes her feel like nothing is worth the pain. I heard her when she told me it feels like all her caring is for nothing, just a gamble and a loss. I also heard her when she found a little sprout of hope to hold on to, and grasped it tight almost before she realized it. She let the hope in, and let it make her vulnerable. It will ache, but it will take root and it will grow. It will do its job if she lets it.

It is only through grieving that we are reminded of our capacity to love, forgive, and understand. It reminds us that callouses are just skin after all, and they are there to hide the tenderest parts of us underneath. Only when a loss scrapes it away and we feel the pain of it are we reminded of the tremendous sensitivity of the human heart.

Sometimes we need to know it. I wouldn't trade the pain of grief for the invincibility of a guarded heart, because it is only when we volunteer to put our hearts on the line that we have capacity for joy, love, kindness, patience, sincerity, forgiveness, and really good games of tug.

Thank you, Bella.