I am slightly sick of complaining about my life, or simply mentioning my life on E2. But this is a Memory, and an Event, and it is very very important. I am just sick of losing things that I love.
Things haven't been going too great. I have had too many mental breakdowns in the last few days, moments of pure, wholesome self-doubt and agony. It is school, it is my friends, it is everything about my life. It seems to be closing in and crushing down on top of me.
Today was shit. I have no idea what to do for my art major, I have only the idea "Death" in my head. I try to get input from other people but it takes me too long to explain who Death is, why he is sad, why I feel sorry for him. I feel sorry for anyone who does not have a perfectly happy life. I worry about people who do not have a perfectly happy life. Death is a mythical creature but I feel sorry for him.
I should stop spending sympathy on other people, I have nothing left for myself.
"LORD, make me to know my end,
And what is the measure of my days,
That I may know how frail I am.
Every night, after dinner we have Bible reading. This is a family thing and while there can be a lot of things said about praying, "the family that prays together, stays together" is certainly true in my case. After Bible reading we all pray and while the prayers are simple, non-personal things, but before we pray we tend to talk. Not always, but it is a time that we talk about our day, things that we are planning and just things in general. Most days, it is the only time that I see my older brother and father.
When we pray we kneel. We have always done this and so we continue to do this. When we kneel the dogs get all excited. Jessie outside seems not to be used to us doing this yet, she jumps up and crouches down by the window as though we are about to play with her. Katie is an old hand, we have done this for as long as we can remember and for as long as she can remember.
We have owned Katie since I was four years old. Only my very earliest memories do not have her in it.
She gets up and moves around our bent legs, seeing if she can squeeze a pat from us. Not tonight. Ahh.. I do not know if I should write this in past tense or present tense because she doesn't do that any more.
Tonight, when I moved my chair back I looked behind for the dog and there was no dog. When I knelt I expected a bushy tail to brush my arm but there was no tail and no dog. It will take me a long time to get used to this.
After art I drive around because I love driving and listening to the radio. When I come down the driveway I am always very careful because these days Katie is a rather blind and mostly deaf but she loves greeting the car. Early this year mum ran into her with the car and I had to take her to the vet, the first time I had ever driven somewhere by myself was to take Katie to the vet. I am always careful when I come down the driveway.
When other people are coming home and I am in my room I can always hear her shrill but very doggie Woof. It is a warning when the postman comes, it is what has scared away possums from our orange trees, it is what keeps the birds away from the boysenberries. I miss her bark already.
Indeed, You have made my days as handbreadths,
And my age is as nothing before You;
Certainly every man at his best state is but vapor.
Reading Psalm 39 tonight with my family these verses hit me because of Katie.
Cancer of the lymph nodes, so she wasn't breathing properly, wasn't eating properly. Losing weight, walking as little as she could everyday... I came home from school and mum and my younger brother took her to the vet. I helped put her in the car. I knew things weren't good but I am terribly practical about all things in life. I would rather her gone than in pain. I knew that she would probably have to be put down. I just didn't think she was going to actually be put down.
I remember Rocky. I remember that terrible thump as his body hit the ground, the eyes as they... Not glazed over. They went out. Slowly faded. As though the light was being drawn inwards until it was extinguished.
I am glad glad glad to my bones that I was not there to see her thin, weak body fall into itself at this last moment.
Katie. Katie the dog we dressed up as a super hero, with a cape and everything. Katie the guard dog, Katie the one we put in a washing basket so we could get her up into the cubby house. Katie the dog I would walk to the post box with. Katie the dog would would follow me into the kitchen every time I was to get a glass of water. Katie who suffered under the rule of Tequila, who suffered equally with Cleo, who couldn't get along with Jessie, who was afraid of the chickens but would sit on our doorstep for always.
Fourteen years old, you died too soon.
I am sick of losing the things I love.
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