Defining Moments #8-4

Death

In the year my daughter was born, I lost Beowulf (my dog), my grandmother, and my father-in-law. Later, my grandfather died. And two years ago, my dog, Buddha, was killed by a car while chasing a rush-hour fox far out of the woods.

The death of a loved one leaves you a wasteland. Your moaning echoes, magnifying your emptiness. Sometimes the wails remind you that you’re still here, and often you wonder whether that’s such a good thing. And sometimes you see them in a painting, hear them in a song, feel them brush past you, just a wisp of a thing.

My grandmother talks to me often; she is sometimes my mother, sometimes myself. Where Buddha is planted, so many tomatoes ripen that we can't pick them all in time. Flowers bloom in profusion. Where Wulf lies beneath our swing. we find solace from that shady spot, a cool place.

Their memory, once too painful to bear, is now a comfort.