Death, Dogs and Taxes
Ben Franklin was right...
When I went to the pet store, I brought Loba with me. The salesperson was helping me find a gift for her birthday.
“How old is she?”
“Seven.”
“Ah,” she said, opening the treats bin, “So she’s middle-aged now.”
Half her dog life is gone. She’s on her descent to death now. Happy birthday!
These news stories are not news. I don’t need to know every ignorant thing that orange man says. The Nazi salutes, the rage-baiting, the trigger words are all designed to drown me. These stories are walls. They want to build a wall on the border. They want a wall between me and my neighbor. They got me laying bricks and mortar inside my head, my own private Amontillado. I can’t get to the place that held peace and green leaves. I thought I had sharper edges.
“Formed in depressions along the shoreline of rocky coasts, tide pools are filled with seawater that gets trapped as the tide recedes. While these small basins at the ocean’s edge typically range from mere inches to a few feet deep and a few feet across, they are packed with sturdy sea life such as snails, barnacles, mussels, anemones, urchins, sea stars, crustaceans, seaweed, and small fish.”
I asked a friend why he never got another dog. He smiled, said in his Southern drawl: “I loved him too hard.”
Look at her. Her fur, blazing copper in this light. She raises her head to say, “Yes?” when I touch the place between her ears. Sitting here, looking at her, is a joy if I can be present, not think about fires, plane crashes, lost friends, pandemics. Her eyes are tide pools. Look how she licks my hand as if she knows, to comfort me, to remind me she is here, right now, come back, stay here, forever. My other hand holds my phone, chain-smoking cat videos.
I feel you!