Puppies

I don't exactly know how these little rascals took over my Life, and I am not exactly sure that I mind all that much that they do anyway.

I am always at a rush to get things done.

At night it is like racing for the home plate. I try to fall asleep as quick as I can because they are exactly like roosters, and wake with the sun.

The rising early morning Sun promises them another fun filled day, as soon as they can get me out of my bed.

Just as soon as those first fingers of fire begin to light up the midnight sky, they open their eyes and start to get bored.

So they give it their very best. Cujo is the indisputable best. He doesn't bark, and he doesn't whine, he sings this tune somewhere in between.

Somewhere , about half way down from where he can really let out a plaintiff howl, they exchange knowing side glances, smiling when they hear my first "shut up out there !"

They know it will be any minute now. Just a few more baleful tunes and it is 'Hello New Day in Puppysville."

I squeeze the last few drops of sleep from the night, and cast a glimpse of the early morning clock.

5:35 AM it beams so proudly .

I note that I got 5 minutes extra today, and that's a bit of a start.

If I get up soon enough, they will have their morning dump on the front yard, instead of the papers on the porch floor. A minute too late, and I only have 'minutes', the first reminder will waft by in the early morning breeze.

At that point I know I can cut down the mess by two thirds, if I get there soon enough. If not, then it's three times the mess, and a whole bunch of other things.

I scramble. I know I look scary with my hair standing up like I am in the middle of a storm, but I rub the sleep from my weary eyes, take them outside, and fasten them to their separate eight foot cords.

Only Garry is on a chain. Back inside I gather up their paper floored toilet.

At four months, a month ago, they made nightly sizeable contributions to keeping my mornings busy.

But now I have five days of newspapers spread over a five by eight foot space on the front porch.

Every morning, I tuck my all important ego in my back pocket, and roll up those papers of doggy poo and doggy pee and stuff them into a garbage bag.

A month ago, I would fill up two garbage bags a day, and sometimes more. At the end of the week there was always this pile of 15 or so garbage bags piled up on my front lawn.

The garbage is picked up on the front of my street, because we have no back lane.

Anyway, then I sponge mop the hallways. the stairs, and the front porch."

And all this time, the puppies are out on the front lawn, which is more like a well used dusty cattle trail, rendering their impression of a scene from 'The Gladiators', growling, and snarling, and rolling around in the dirt.

This is all fine and dandy, but it is barely six in the morning, and my neighbors aren't ready to be woken up.

So I get their four plates of food before them as fast as I can.

As soon as they hear the crackle of the paper dog food bag, they start getting excited and really make a noise.

It is a three ring circus out there, Sundays and holidays included.

Now that they are getting on to six months, the papers on the porch are more often dry than not. I would rather clean their messes off of the 'cattle trail', than off my porch floor.

Anyway, I developed a Zen attitude about it all. And it had a lot to do with stuffing my Ego in my back pocket.

Somehow, it toppled me from my lofty perch, and brought me closer to Mother Earth.

Somehow I feel more at one with the whole process, like I am getting in tune with the Universe, but on a very small scale. This small level of 'goodness' will infuse into the Lives of these pups, and they will be better pets for someone, who will benefit from having a good dog, and in turn, do good to others.

It is like an investment into the Cosmos, sewing seeds of goodness, and setting them adrift, in a troubled sea.

I hop up on my bike, and one by one, I let them run until I think they might be tiring, which in their case is about a quarter mile longer than I like. Actually I would like them to get their exercise in the front yard.

Somewhere in the afternoon, I will take each of them for the 'long run'.

Cujo and Garry run together to the city center fountain, and then on further to the Library fountain.

Patrick does a slow but steady pace over the bridge to the river and back, and Meenew likes the city center fountain as well.

At midnight, they all run one by one, along the streets and through the park.

I run Garry off leash, much to the surprise of the neighborhood cats, who dart up trees, like puppets on a string. More times than not I will wheel through the tougher back alleys nearby. Sometimes there will be a group of three or four guys, laughing loudly, and slapping each other on the shoulder.

Garry will be back a bit, sniffing some garbage can, or leaving his signature on one.

If I were by myself, I might feel concerned, at three o'clock in the morning in a dark alley like that. But you can hear Garry before you see him. From out of the shadows thunders this streaking dog.

He will run right past them, but they get a little wide eyed, as he approaches, running towards them. Garry is excellent security.

Today is September the eighth, and Cujo has stopped eating. He ate a lot of bones last night and I hope he isn't having a problem.

Sept. 9/98 Wednesday

Cujo still hasn't eaten. I worry about these things. He is very quiet, and prefers to be alone. The other two seem to be lost without their leader, and I get to sleep in the morning. He has a very loose stool, and remains quiet.

Sept. 10/98 Thursday

Cujo is visibly losing weight and drinks a lot and then throws it all up again. It looks like he might have an inflamed gut, or a bone stuck in there somewhere. I see blood in his stool, and he still is very quiet. After a very short run, I can see that he is having difficulty breathing. I fear that he has caught a bug, and hope that it isn't the dreaded Parvo Virus.

Sept 11/98 Friday

Meenew and Patrick have slowed down somewhat as well today. They still eat a little bit so I watch them closely. I keep Cujo by himself as he seems to prefer that to the romping of the other two.

By mid afternoon, I call the vet for some advice. I am told that I could bring the dog in, but a doctor would not be seeing him until Monday because they were all gone for the weekend.

Sept 12/98 Saturday

It has been five days since Cujo has eaten and he looks very very sick. He is breathing with great difficulty, and he has lost maybe a quarter of his weight. He drinks a lot of fresh water, but throws it up shortly after.

Patrick and Meenew have not eaten all day now either. All the dogs are laying down resting. It seems very unnatural here.

Sept. 13/98 Sunday

Both Meenew and Patrick are following Cujo's exact steps. I firmly believe that they have the dreaded Parvo Virus. I search the Internet, and enter pet chat rooms looking for some help. The virus attacks the lining of their small intestine, hence nothing can be digested or adsorbed. It spreads through the bloodstream to the marrow and stops red blood cell production. Most dogs with Parvo, die from dehydration and blood loss.

It is like a morgue here, it is so silent. Even if the vet diagnoses them to have Parvo, there is nothing at this point that he can do short of intravenous injection, and blood transfusions.

Cujo has lost so much weight I confuse him with Meenew. I can tell that Cujo is very close to Death. Meenew will have no extra weight to lose, and thin Patrick is very big, but very slim.

Sept. 14/98 Monday

The vet confirms my worst fears. The only outside possibility is aggressive treatment of invasive procedures such as intravenous injection and blood transfusions. The cost would be around seven hundred and fifty dollars a day. The pups are going to have to make it on their own. Cujo is more mobile. When I opened a can of salmon, he came over. Much to my surprise he ate most of it right there. This encourages me greatly.

Sept. 15/98 Tuesday.

Everyone sleeps until around noon. I have them all on my bed. Patrick refuses to move, so I let him lie there. He looks very very ill, and I am most worried about how he will fare. Three hours later his breathing is very labored and I lie down beside him. I hug him gently, making sure that I do not impede his breathing.... I can feel him slipping away, and there is not a thing I can do.

He dies in my arms right then and there.

I was devastated.

A few minutes later Tiffany walked in. We both held each other and cried. Poor Patrick was gone forever.

Tiffany covered him with the petals of white flowers and bright orange daisies.

In the shade of a tree that I planted in my back yard some eighteen years ago, I dug a grave for Patrick and buried him there.

Back inside the house Meenew was also looking very unsteady, and Tiffany was terrified. I believe she would have traded ten years of her Life to give to Meenew.

But it was all up to Meenew at this point. Six hours later, she came to rest on my bed. I held her frail body in my arms and she slipped away to be with Patrick.

I buried Meenew at the foot of a young apple tree in the front yard and covered her grave with bricks of stone .

This was a very sad house that night.

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My mind was swimming with grief, and wondered what might have happened a hundred years ago when early settlers watched their stricken children die one by one, and not be able to do a thing about it.

And I wondered what it would be like to be children a hundred years ago, and watch your parents die.

But all that didn't help. I was devastated and Tiffany was ten times worse. I had a brief talk with her and tried to get her to see things in a different perspective. But what words can you say, that will bring any sense to this bizarre madness.

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I know that somehow, we have to remember that it is not the end of the World, and we will be the ones who will survive, and witness still many more days, exactly like this one.

And like all wounded things we will heal, and that healing will come from time .

Indeed, Time will provide us with many happy days. And this will be just a memory. And there will be, like in most wounds, a scar, but there will be other scars there too, from different occasions, from when we take on the horns of Life, and live Life to its fullest.

So we let ourselves express our grief, over the passing of these two little puppies, and cry in sorrow.

Still, as much as you can't stop the tears from flowing, you can't stop the sun from shining. There will always be a tomorrow. And tomorrow will bring you other Lives which will have significance to you. This is what makes the World go around.

It is difficult to speak of Life after Death, and whether these puppies went into their next Life, and somewhere a newborn baby cries.

But a lot of the Big Books say that Reincarnation is what happens after we die. That is we go into another Life form, or at least, into another Life.

For it is said that if we live out our Life in the parched desert, our next Life will be different, and there will be green grass. And our next Life after that Life will be even better than that.

There is a variable however, and that variable is about how we lived that Life. Because if we lived a Life that was in harmony with our environment, and we allowed goodness to happen without interfering with it, well then we would be living a 'good' Life.

And having demonstrated that 'goodness' that we are capable of, we will be intrusted with a better Life, after the Death of this one.

And each successive Life will give us the opportunity, to live a better Life, and in doing so, evolve into a higher Spiritual plane.

This belief has my vote of confidence, as to what if anything happens after Death, but I surely can not confirm anything.

So if this is true, well Patrick and his litter sister Meenew are born into a greater Life, because it was almost as though they were too 'good' for this Life, and that they should go to their next Life forthwith. And the 'good' they will bring about in that next Life will off set the pain they leave behind in our hearts.

For I know that although it was so terribly short, their Life they shared with us, was pure joy, and we would be without, if they never did grace our lives, for the almost six months that they did. Their sparkling eyes playful antics, and never ending enthusiasm will be with us always.

So I thank them for being there with us and that our paths crossed however so briefly.

Because I will never forget sweet Meenew, spirited like a fawn, who added new meaning to the word 'affection'. A little friend who got me hugging things again. Cujo will testify to that fact. I hug him ten times a day more than I did before, and tend to him with extra special care.

Meenew brought that 'goodness' about. And Cujo and I are both better off because of it. Like the Angel she was, Meenew came with a message, and left, to spread the word around. Meenew will always be part of my Life, and I accept the scar it left, when she departed.

Patrick was a 'one of a kind' sort of fellow himself. We called him Mr Perfect because he was just so perfect as a specimen of a dog. He was perfect as a living being. He was a playful little boy right to the time he left us.

We will never see him running up a mountain, or rolling in the sparkling snow. He also, was too good for this Life, and would only share his path with us for an all too short of a while.

Maybe he is chasing pussy cats amongst the stars, and then again, maybe somewhere up on a craggy mountainside nest, a baby eagle cracks through his shell, and snuggles in the downy feathers of his parent... Maybe that's Patrick.

Whatever, for sure Patrick lives in my mind, a memory of a child Prince, a noble pup bigger than the rest. With the rich golden red colors of his Mother, and the huge shape of his Father, Patrick had 'promise' written all over him.

You could communicate with Patrick, and he always had so much dignity.

I couldn't wait to see what he would grow up to become.

That little boy took his last gasps for air in my arms. Never ever, will that sinking feeling of being able to do nothing ever leave me. He just died, and I was holding a non breathing body of my puppy.

I still do not quite understand what message he imparts, but never in a thousand years, would I ever forget Patrick, and the irreversibility of Death.

I look at every living thing, and I see it will also die, you, me.... everything.

Patrick responded well to hugs, and playful touching. Today when I meet strangers in an elevator or at a cash register, I try and find something to say to them. Because there will come a time when you can not hug or say anything to anyone any more. You simply can not turn back the hands of time.

Patrick's message, I think, is to get out and be as much of a person as you can be. Not by flashing and demonstrating, but by just 'being', like he was.

That's why we called him Mr Perfect. He was just so cool.

I bid a fond 'farewell' to my precious little animal children, and promise to never let their contribution to my Life be forgotten.

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So now it's up to Cujo now,the little trooper that he is, he has earned some new stripes, and willingly steps up to the plate.

Cujo and Garry,

Father and Son,

two peas in a very small pod,

one is smaller though,

not as small as he used to be,

when he was born six months ago.

We will talk about Cujo, the Chosen One, next.

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