It was time. She knew so, the vet said so, I thought so. I drew Reiki symbols over her head, stroked her side as the valium lured her out of anxious pacing into peaceful slumber, willing and needing to depart (it was time, it was), and now I celebrate the life of this once feisty little Schnauzer who came to me like an angel 15 years ago and led me through crisis into clarity with her zest, her verve, her love. Ciao, Grazia. You were aptly named.
In Bernard Malamud's "The Magic Barrel," a tentative young rabbi explains his arrival at his professional station: " I came to God not because I loved him but because I did not." Sometimes I read a line and pause to reflect a minute before continuing. Often I read without needing to register the words because they're either familiar or insignificant. But occasionally words immobilize me, not because they possess extraordinary power in themselves but because they arrive at the precise time and place I need to receive their message. I came to God not because I loved him but because I did not. What a contrast-based, convoluted route to enlightenment. Aha! But this is how so many of us arrived here. When I began studying loss and death, people questioned me, barely able to camouflage their distaste for the subject, which usually emerged as a sneaky grimace. Why on earth would you want to study death? I answer the way Malamud’s rabbi would have: I came to death b...
Comments
It seems that the choices are not always choices.
(((LISA))) and the rest of the Shaw household.
xxxxxxxxj
My heart goes out to you right now.
1Heart,
Geoffrey
I am sorry for your loss, for I know it is truly a great loss.