A couple weeks ago Becky came home once again to find that Zeke had fallen, and was unable to get up. I have spent much of the time since at home with Zeke. I’ve actually planned to go in to work a couple times and had Zeke strand himself early in the morning, sometimes more than once, and called in at the last minute, blowing off two meetings that I remembered and perhaps more that I did not.
In that time spent at home with him, which followed on the heels of two weeks just before Thanksgiving in which I stayed home on purpose, I have learned a few things.
1) I really don’t miss my job when I don’t go in. At all. I miss having a routine and being able to leave the house without guilt, but I find myself remarkably unconcerned at the prospect of losing this job because of my staying with Zeke. (Becky has been suggesting I move on to other things for some years now.)
2) The letter carrier that works our route these days in the second half of the week is just insanely hot.
3) I am as ready as I will ever be for Zeke to go. Which is not very ready, true. But I seem to have reached some sort of acceptance, of perhaps a temporary nature. Once or twice I have come upon him sleeping so soundly that it seemed the time had come and gone without my noticing. His breaths are very far between. He does not rouse to a caress of his chest. The other night at 2:00 a.m. I was certain for about thirty seconds that he had died, and was debating whether to wake Becky or just to go back to sleep and deal with things in the morning when he toook a deep breath, opened his milky eyes and gazed at me for a moment.
That is how familiar, how much a constant companion his end has become: I actually considered going back to sleep.
He might live six more months, or six days. There are mornings when he looks as though he could reach twenty, and then there are mornings when we double check the phone number on the least fun web page I have ever read. (This is not a reflection on the vet who owns the page, for whose existence I am surpassingly grateful.) Neighbors who love him, and most of them do, have quietly said their goodbyes. And then the next day they greet him joyfully, happy to see him plodding down the street, and they assure him that he is a very good dog and say goodbye again.
I am surprised that I’m not sadder. I am grateful for every single moment. Neighbors say warm things toward me about my apparent patience and gentleness in taking care of Zeke, and all I feel is wonder at their words. It is not patience that allows me to sit placidly next to him in the park as he naps, resting up for the trek back home. It is not patience that keeps my stride from lengthening as he hobbles, that loosens the tendons in my shoulders as I carry him back up the hill on bad days. It is something between gratitude and avarice. I want every last damn second.
Posted by: Chris Clarke
Categories:
Zeke
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