Love Survives

There is a land of the living
and a land of the dead
and the bridge is love ~
the only survival, the only meaning.

-- Thornton Wilder

Souls

If having a soul
means being able to feel
love and loyalty and gratitude,
then animals are better off
than a lot of humans.

-- James Herriot

Gifts

They come to us,
from shelters or friends or in any number of ways,
these beings of fur or feather or other outer shells.
They come to us wanting only
to be fed, sheltered, and loved.
And we take them into our homes and our hearts.
They may have prized pedigrees,
or they may be abandoned or abused
and rough around the edges.
But there is something about them,
some sort of light in their eyes
that tells us they are meant for us.
And a sweet dance of love
begins with our new friends.
We watch them delightedly discover their new home,
laugh at the antics of kitten or puppy,
smile as the former lost soul
settles comfortably into our arms.
They become a beloved member of our family,
a reminder of the uninhibited joy
that we have often forgotten how to feel.
The dog that excitedly runs
to greet his human friend returning home,
or the contented cat curled up on a lap
remind us of how large
unfettered love can be.
They come to teach us to remember how to love.
They come to teach us that our hearts,
so often battered by this world that we struggle through,
are still open enough to feel wonder and mystery
and a precious connection to another being.
And we love them, and care for them,
and experience the joy
we thought was lost from our lives.
But life is fragile.
One day, perhaps unexpectedly,
or perhaps after a long struggle with illness,
our precious friends are gone.
And we mourn them deeply.
We feel lost, and alone,
and that the joy is once again gone from our lives.
We feel anger, and pain, and fear.
We question Deity, and wonder why.
Life is fragile.
Their lives are more fragile than ours.
We cannot escape death,
and for it to take our most precious friends,
who ask so little,
seems unfair and too much for us to bear.
But they leave us always with a gift.
They leave us with that love they gave, that joy they sparked.
Our hearts are larger for having loved them.
We are enriched by having these special souls in our lives,
even if it was for too brief a time.
Love never dies.
And the love that was created
by our special friends who came into our lives
is a living thing,
always a part of our being.
We may think our hearts are closing again,
but we cannot erase the fact
that they have been opened.
They teach us love for a reason:
so that we will have it in our hearts always.
Each day, each act of kindness or love,
is a tribute to our furbabies who have moved on.
Honor your special friend with kindness and love.
Each day, reach out to your living furbabies
and let them know how precious they are.
Reach out to others in your life
and let the love your friend brought you live on.
Reach out to others in need, whether human or animal.
I can think of no better gift than the love they teach us.
And I can think of no better way to honor their memories
than by extending that love.
In this way, they will truly live forever.

by Ginger-lyn Summer
20 September 2000
Reprinted with Permission of the Author
http://www.angelfire.com/folk/glsummer

If . . .

If you can start the day without caffeine,

If you can get going without pep pills,

If you can always be cheerful, ignoring aches and pains,

If you can resist complaining

and boring people with your troubles,

If you can eat the same food every day

and be grateful for it,

If you can understand when your loved ones

are too busy to give you any time,

If you can overlook it

when those who love you take it out on you

when something goes wrong through no fault of yours,

If you can take criticism and blame without resentments,

If you can ignore a friend’s limited education 

and never correct him,

If you can resist treating a rich friend

better than a poor friend,

If you can face the world without lies and deceit,

If you can conquer tension without medical help,

If you can relax without liquor,

If you can sleep without the aid of drugs,

If you can say honestly

that deep in your heart you have no prejudice

against creed, color, religion or politics,

Then, my friend,

you are almost as good

as your Dog.

— Author Unknown

An Old Man and His Dog

An old man and his dog were walking down a dirt road with fences on both sides.  They came to a gate in the fence and looked in.  It was nice, with grassy, woodsy areas — just what a hunting dog and man would like — but it had a big sign saying No Trespassing, so they walked on.

They came to a beautiful gate with a person in white robes standing there. 

“Welcome to Heaven,” the robed man said.  The old man was happy and started in with his dog following him.

The gatekeeper stopped him. 

“Dogs aren’t allowed.  I’m sorry, but he can’t come with  you.”

“What kind of Heaven won’t allow dogs?” the old man said.  “If he can’t come in, then I will stay out here with him.  He’s been my faithful companion all his life.  I can’t desert him now.”

“Suit yourself,” the gatekeeper said.  “But I have to warn you, the Devil’s on this road and he’ll try to sweet talk you into his area.  He’ll promise you anything, but the dog can’t go there either.  If you won’t leave the dog, you’ll spend Eternity on this road.”

So the old man and his dog went on.  They came to a rundown fence with a gap in it — no gate, just a hole.  Another old man was inside. 

“Excuse me, sir.  My dog and I are getting mighty tired.  Mind if we come in and sit in the shade for a while?”

“Come on in,” the man said.  “There’s some cold water under that tree over there.  Make yourselves comfortable.”

“You’re sure my dog can come in?  The man down the road said dogs weren’t allowed anywhere.”

“Would you come in if you had to leave the dog?”

“No, sir.  That’s why I didn’t go to Heaven.  He said the dog couldn’t come in.  We’ll be spending Eternity on this road, and a glass of cold water and some shade would be mighty fine right about now.  But I won’t come in if my buddy here can’t come too, and that’s final.”

The man smiled a big smile and said, “Welcome to Heaven.”

“You mean this is Heaven?  Dogs are allowed?  How come that fellow down the road said they weren’t?” 

"That was the Devil, and he gets all the people who are willing to give up a lifelong companion for a comfortable place to stay.  They soon find out their mistake, but then it’s too late.  The dogs come here, the fickle people stay there.  God wouldn’t allow dogs to be banned from Heaven.  After all, He created them to be man’s companions in life.  Why would He separate them in death?”

—Found on the Internet by Carroll Brown;  Reprinted in APLB Newsletter, Spring 1999

Where to Bury a Dog

There are various places in which a dog may be buried. We are thinking now of a Setter, whose coat was flame in the sunshine, and who, so far as we are aware, never entertained a mean or an unworthy thought.

This Setter is buried beneath a cherry tree, under four feet of garden loam, and at its proper season the cherry tree strews petals on the green lawn of his grave.

Beneath a cherry tree, or an apple, or any flowering shrub is an excellent place to bury a good dog. Beneath such trees, such shrubs, he slept in the drowsy summer, or gnawed at a flavorful bone, or lifted his head to challenge some strange intruder. These are good places, in life or in death.

Yet it is a small matter. For if the dog be well remembered, if sometimes he leaps through your dreams as actual as in life, eyes kindling, laughing, begging, it matters not at all where the dog sleeps. On a hill where the wind is unrebuked, and the trees are roaring, or beside a stream he knew in puppyhood, or somewhere in the flatness of a pasture land where most exhilarating cattle graze. It is all one to you, and nothing is gained, and nothing lost — if memory lives. But there is one best place to bury a dog.

If you will bury him in this spot, he will come to you when you call — come to you over the grim, dim frontiers of death, and down the well-remembered path, and to your side again. And though you call a dozen living dogs to heel, they shall not growl at him nor resent his coming, for he belongs there. People may scoff at you, who see no lightest blade of grass bent by his footfall, who hear no whimper, who may never really have had a dog. Smile at them, for you shall know something that is hidden from them, and which is well worth the knowing.

The one best place to bury a dog is in the heart of his master. 

— From a Portland Oregonian editorial by Den Iiur Lampanon, in response to a subscriber’s Letter to the Editor asking, “Where shall I bury my dog?”

I Won't Apologize For Grieving

By Bob Deits, in Life After Loss: A Practical Guide to Renewing Your Life After Experiencing Major Loss

. . . In one winter two disastrous events happened at the same time, each of which made an impact on my life.   First, a number of men were killed in a mining accident . . . The other tragic event was having our 15-year-old cat ‘put to sleep.’  Can you guess which of those events caused me to cry my eyes out?  You guessed it — the cat! 
 

There is scarcely any comparison between the loss of human life and the end of a semi-crippled old cat.  But Samantha was my cat.  I loved her.  She was a permanent part of our history.  Her loss was not an academic thing.  I didn’t look at television or newspaper accounts of her death and say, “That’s too bad!” and go on to the sports page.  She was mine.  Her loss plunged me into grief . . . This was my loss and at that moment, as far as I was concerned, it was the worst thing to happen in the whole world.  I didn’t want anyone to tell me how great it was that she didn’t suffer, or how far beyond a normal life expectancy she had lived.  
 

I wasn’t very objective about the loss of Samantha as compared to the mining disaster, or the loss of my parents some years earlier or the starving masses in the Third World.  Grief is like that.  It isn’t helped by saying, “How childishly you are behaving over a cat!” 
 

I have known deeper times of grief . . . I have held the hands of friends as they died, baptized stillborn infants, helped families decide when to disconnect life-support systems and worked with parents whose children were murdered. 
 

Each of those experiences was painful.  Nevertheless, at the moment my cat died, her loss was the very worst kind of grief for me in the whole world . . . 
 

Never apologize for grieving.  Remind yourself as often as needed that the very worst kind of loss is always yours.  Learn to acknowledge that your loss is worthy of grief . . .