Thursday, February 19, 2009

A Mother Knows...

I'm not a mother in the 'gave birth to' sense of the word...but I did bring a living being into my home, who's needs came before my own 99% of the time. In 2001 I adopted a Cocker Spaniel named Kelli. That didn't seem like a "doggy" name...but I didn't have the heart to change it...so when I'd yell out into the backyard..."Kelli!!! Dinner!!!" my neighbors probably thought I had a kid of the two-legged variety. Well my four-legged child recently had to be put to sleep. I can't imagine what parents go through that have actual human being children that they've given birth to...or adopted...pass away and leave the quiet in their home behind, like the quiet I'm experiencing in my home now. That was the first thing that really hit me, other than the sight of my furry kid roaming the house...was how quiet my house became. It was just the two of us and how could a dog possibly make a difference in the noise factor? She didn't make a lot of noise when she was inside...she saved that for when I was asleep and she was going in and out of her doggy door barking at NOTHING. In fact, I called her my little ninja, because even with her collar on, she'd sneak up on you like she was Special Op's. The quiet I noticed, the night I came home from the vet...alone...was more of a total stillness...the lack of presence of another living and breathing thing. I couldn't get over how noticeable it was. I still notice it and it's been over a month now. A couple of months before she died, I had this 'urgency' to not want to be gone as much...to spend more time at home with her. I didn't talk to others about this, it was just something I felt. She was coming up on turning 12 and previous research I'd done on her breed, showed that their average lifespan is about 13 years. Even though a dog can obviously live a lot longer than that...or a lot less...I felt like I was coming upon that time. I really wanted to just be with her on the weekends when I wasn't working...not like in the past, where I would sometimes leave in the morning and not come home until late in the afternoon. Of course the guilt was there...it's my day off...and to her it was like another workday. But these past few months...the feeling was there. I just wanted to read beside her more...sit and watch TV with her more...cuddle with her more..."be" with her more. When her 'strange' behavior started and we were making more frequent visits to the vet, the urgency felt stronger...and there was just this 'feeling' that this past Christmas was going to be my last one with her. Even though I wasn't an over the top Paris Hilton doggy mom...I was still a dedicated mom to this four-legged being, who sadly, was treated, loved, and cared for much better than millions of children in this world. The fact that she wasn't of the two-legged variety, didn't change the strong maternal feelings I had for her...and the maternal instincts that women are given. So when that unspoken urgency came over me...where my child was concerned, I just knew...