Outside the big living room window
which is about 12′ wide and goes all the way to the floor, the squirrels and chipmunks raced along the retaining wall driving max nuts with barking for many years.
As G-d is my witness, the morning we took max to the vet for the last time, when we returned, the squirrels and chipmunks did a single file- well, parade, for lack of a better word- down the retaining wall, and stopped and looked in at the window, as if to say, “yeah, we’re gonna miss the little bugger too”
Tincture of time will do the best it can to fix this hollowness. I know I will someday have another dog, or nine, because I owe it to every dog I ever had to make sure every one I can give a home, I do. Just, right now, it’s hard to think of it. So I’m making plans to visit friends with pups. Just to keep my hand in.
I’ve found that the sooner I’ve got another dog the sooner I feel better. I know it’s not the same for everyone but it works for me.
The dogs will find YOU, Og. Tends to happen that way, more often than not.
You know, Harley is buried about 8′ away, outside my gunroom window. Little black bundle of cat here, Bonnie, sits in that window and communes with him, there. She *knows*, and she’d never so much as met him. He was gone before he was here. But, she knows. You can see it in her focus out of that window.
They sense things differently from us, it’s clear.
Meanwhile, pet every pup you see.
And don’t even look at a litter of kittens. With those big soft eyes. And “mews”. And cute. All adorable. You’ve been warned.
Jim
Sunk New Dawn
Galveston, TX
One reason I stay away from pups and kittens is I feel the need to take them all with me.
They do fill the hole old friends have left.
The one will find you.
If for no one else, do it for the squirrels.
I’m here to report cats are terrible little thieves. They look at you and take your heart. I’ve seen more than one big guy totally undone by a tiny bundle of fur and a mew.
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xjw9ms_feed-the-kitty_shortfilms
Puppies too … one of them will look you in the eye sometime soon and that will be the end of it.
When the time is right, you should get two. Every dog needs a cat.
You’re right, it takes time. That hole in the heart takes time to heal. Never really heals up completely, there’s always a little space, but you gather it up and go forward. Otherwise life would be unbearable. Not today maybe but in the fullness of time. (Though we have had situations in this house where we had animals that grieved so hard and kept looking for their friend that we had to get another animal in right away so they wold stop looking.) That’s how animals teach us that while the immediate moment may be terrible, there is fresh joy around the corner.
Thinking of you and yours today, and your good boy dog, and the philosopher Chuck Jones, who taught us a lot.
Jenny
Im not a cat person, ive had them and even good cats arent anything special to me. I would easily adopt every dog, though.
I’m sorry for your loss. It’s amazing how a grown man’s heart can ache after the loss of his companion. I had a sixteen year old Lab that died almost twenty years ago that I still dream about as if he’s still alive.
With any luck, you’ll see Max again. I’ve known several Good Dogs that I look forward to seeing again someday.
Corey Ford’s classic ‘The Road to Tinkhamtown’:
http://forums.gunbroker.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=454187
Make sure you have plenty of Kleenex handy.
When we have a weekend off together, and hopefully soon, some Abby Normal time. She’s not Barkley but that soft black hair next to you on our ugly Ikea couch you all know and hate, will feel like old times.
Love from our household to yours. Call any time.