And when one of us is gone
And one of us is left to carry on
Then remembering will have to do
Our memories alone will get us through
Think about the days of me & you ❤️💔
You And Me Against The World – Helen Reddy
He was the great love of my life. This loss is one of those ones that hit the hardest even though they’re all equally devastating in another way. This loss has always felt like something on a whole other level in some way. At first I just assumed it’s because I knew him for so long. He was just always by my side, and I never remembered life before him since he came and couldn’t ever fathom life after him. But then I realized it’s not the case because if I would have lost him years before when I did not know him as long it would have been the same pain and profound loss. It’s a deep gaping wound that never seems to close. It feels like a physical part of me is missing, like a big chunk of something has been ripped out of me. An unearthly kind of pain. Sometimes it feels unbearable. He was just so much a part of me. It feels like I wasn’t meant to live without him. I know it’s not true. Dogs are supposed to get old and die much sooner than humans. But it still feels that way.
My constant, my familiar, my safe, my home…in all the uncertainty & unknown.
I remember the first day I walked into the room and everything was gone. His bed was gone, his crate that was just for when he wanted to be in it, never closed, was gone, his toys were gone, his treat jar was gone, his doggy gate was gone, his notebook & pen to keep track of his walks & potty breaks & water and treats were gone, his food & water bowls were gone, his large bag of dog food was gone, his leash, gone, his doggy bags, gone, the fur that he was always shedding that got on things, gone, every single trace of him was gone, every shred of evidence that he ever existed was gone.
Just gone.
I remember the surprise. I have never seen such an empty room. There was a table and chair, things for preparing food on the counter, papers around, a bookshelf full of books, various other things around the whole room…but the room was empty. I have never felt such profound emptiness. I remember the sense of panic that arose in me. The heaviness that weighed me down, threatening to pull me to the floor, legs becoming weak, just like the day I let him go. My eyes frantically scanning the room for just one clue that he was once here. But there was none. Desperation growing somewhere deep inside me, taking root in a place I’m not sure I could identify, a claustrophobic kind of fear taking me over.
I looked around, and it was like he never existed except for the void in me aching to be filled, the throbbing pain that surged through me and all over me with nowhere to go. Completely alone with just the memories & the raw pain letting me know he once lived. I felt that I would run to the ends of the earth to find him. It may have been the second most painful moment of this life of mine.
A disarray of memories swirling around my head, inspiring both joy & anguish, but more anguish. Him running through the glistening snow on a cold Winter’s day, and rolling around in the green grass on a sunny Summer morning, crunching through the Fall leaves on the cobblestone streets we walked upon each day, rubbing his little face in the Spring flowers blooming in our favorite park, running along the Schyulkill river trail side by side every morning & evening, the big smile on his face as we ran against the wind, the wind blowing through his fur and my long hair, not a care in the world, standing on his back legs in the kitchen to look at the plants, running around the table making me chase him to get his leash on, oh how I miss that leash that was just so him, haven’t seen it in so long, randomly giving me a bunch of kisses even though he rarely ever kissed, kissing wasn’t his love language. But he reserved a few just for me. I don’t think he ever kissed anyone else.
I remembered the late Fall day in 2020 when I first heard him bark & growl after years of knowing him, when I first saw him angry, fur bristling as we walked alone together late at night on a dark narrow and desolate cobblestone street. He never barked or growled. At anyone, ever. Not humans or any other animals. If ever he did not like someone, he would completely ignore them. He was extremely gentle and quiet, an introverted boy. Mostly indifferent to everything & everyone around him. He peered into the shadows ahead. He suddenly growled then barked and jumped in front of me, standing as tall as he possibly could as if to ward away something or someone lurking in the shadows that he thought was a threat to me. Still the ball of energy he always was, strong and healthy, youthful, thinking his little body could protect me if only he stood his ground and kept me back and whatever it was, in front of us. He would not calm down, so we turned around and walked the other way, and he was satisfied. I remember the feeling bordering on shock because I have known him for so long and never saw him react that way in all our years together. I don’t think anyone else has either. I remember wanting to tell everyone, wanting to tell the world that Koto just barked and growled. It was the most amazing thing. He was not jumpy or ever startled, nothing scared him. He took everything as it came and just ignored it. For him to act that way, there had to be a real reason.
Sometimes I wonder if he saved my life that night.
Years later, I held him during his last hour here on Earth as we sat in our favorite park that we visited together for years. Clung to him as if my own life depended on his. My heart wanted to plead with him not to go, but my head knew he had to. Resting my heavy head on his as my heavy heavy heart sunk into my abdomen, feeling his little heart beat against mine, the last beats it would ever take. It still felt strong, steady, but his frail, weakened little body hung limp, like a ragdoll in my arms, no longer able to protect me like that Fall day all those years before, his eyes glazed over, no longer seeing, his legs collapsing if I tried to get him to stand, no longer caring to eat or drink,…his time here was up after almost sixteen years even though his heart was still strong against mine. And even though my arms refused to let go.
Saying goodbye to him, letting him go, was the single most painful moment of this life of mine. In that one pivotal moment I have lived an entire lifetime, maybe even a thousand lifetimes, lived every emotion there is to live. Both empty and full, completely gutted like a scene in a horror movie, or so it felt. In that moment, I did more living than I have in all the decades I have been alive. In that moment I became completely whole even though it felt and still feels so utterly shattering. I broke into a million little pieces to become one so completely whole. It’s a wholeness that nothing can touch. Even if I ever feel that something in life or in myself is lacking or someone else tells me it is, I can retreat to that place and find my wholeness there.
After letting him go that day, I walked by a park we sometimes visited through the years, not our favorite park, but one we sometimes walked to when he wanted to take me there. I saw the most vibrant flowers. I hungrily took in their beauty, desperately hoping for some sense of comfort or hope. For a fleeting moment those flowers appeared to be smiling at me as if to make everything momentarily ok. I held them in my heart for the rest of that warm Spring day allowing them to cool & sooth the bitter burning pain for a brief moment in time. He loved flowers. He made it a point to stop and put his nose right on them whenever we walked through our parks.
I have a silver necklace with a charm that has a “K” engraved on one side and a flower engraved on the other side. I bought it shortly after he died. I got it because it’s both of our initial and to remember all our days in the flowers together and how much he loved them. 🌹I have loved & lost so many pets through the years, both my own at home and the ones I work with. So I don’t buy things in memory of them or anything because there are just so many. But I was inspired to for this one.
This is a story that plays in my head again & again as I walk through life without him. Sometimes it’s quiet & somber and just here living in me, and sometimes it’s so loud and heavy and dizzying & agonizing it nearly brings me to my knees. But it’s our story. And it’s as beautiful as it is heartbreaking. It’s breathtaking, both in the unpleasant way that knocks the wind out of you like a punch in the gut, and the pleasant way that makes you gasp in beauty when you see the most stunning view you have ever seen.
And at the end of this life, whether it be tomorrow or in 100 more years, I’m going to say that in this life knowing him, loving him, walking with him by my side for all those years, was my greatest honor. ❤️
Time goes by so slowly
And time can do so much
Are you still mine
I need your love
I need your love
God speed your love
To me ❤️
Xoxo Kim
