The Garden

First of all I want to thank all of you who have left comments here, and written me lovely private messages, as well as countless people who have written to me on Facebook during this time of losing Tanner. Your kindness is more deeply appreciated than I can say. Bless you all.

Next, as I wrote to one dear one who sent me a note this morning, and said to my dear friend Jeff on the phone, I wonder if things will ease a little after today? I know I keep saying this sort of thing but I don’t think it’s uncommon. Exactly this time last Friday, one week ago, Aaron and Stephanie and the baby were here helping make a beautiful pot garden on the deck. The 3 pugs were dancing round and about as they do, and Tanner, in his glory outside where he loved it so much, was right there, but sometime around 10 that night he went outside through the doggy door and didn’t come back in, nor would he ever again. Aaron was back that night on a sadder mission, to bury little Tanner in the pink gated garden just across from the deck where we had all been earlier in the day.

My mind has continued to tick through the days, through the hours, “One week ago he was still here…” but now we are up to the week anniversary of his death. Tonight when I go to bed Tanner will have been gone a week. Somehow I think the obsessive counting of the days, the hours, will have passed. Then there will just be the loss, the sadness, the first waves of shock past and the deeper business of grief will just continue on, it’s process and progress uncertain but present as it filters through my psyche and life without him.

Jeff said something to me on the phone today that I hadn’t considered. He said that of course it would have been terrible and I would have been grieving losing Tanner in any case but now, off all meds after so many years, decades of being on them, I am feeling this loss more acutely because there is nothing cushioning the pain at all. It’s something to think about. But in 2014, just months after the fire, when I had to have my beloved Sampson put to sleep in my arms after a stroke left him in terrible shape, he, my heart pug for many years, I came home (fully medicated and then some!) and shaved my head. I was reeling in such terrible despair I couldn’t cope with the loss. And he was 16 1/2 and had been slowing down for some time, his death was not so terribly unexpected but still devastating. Tanner was my baby, and completely unexpected. Would medication have helped? I doubt it.

Finally, I wrote in response to my dear friend Katya’s kind comment yesterday that while Tanner’s loss is wicked hard it seems to be worse because it seems to be bigger than just losing him. Maybe it is what happens when one unexpectedly, and too young, dies? I wrote in answer to her, “Tanner’s loss has opened the door to other losses. How to handle one loss at a time without being swallowed up whole?” I sit in my big recliner snuggling sweet Delilah and Pugsley pugs and I become terrified that something will happen to them. I worry about other losses. I feel afraid in the world, untethered. I am worrying about things I haven’t worried about in some time. I don’t feel safe in the world. I look around me at every little thing and everything frightens me. I can barely breathe. And I am dreading today.

Today I have to go over to my vet’s office to get the written prescription for Pugsley’s medication. He is on hydrocodone because of a collapsed trachea. Last June when he was diagnosed Dr. Dixon said I might not have him another 6 months but he has done so well on the medication most of the time you wouldn’t have a clue anything was wrong with him. The medication is a miracle and he can’t be without it so I have to get the written script and go have it filled today. But walking in the vet’s office where I took Tanner just weeks ago for his yearly checkup and he was deemed healthy only to return today with him gone is going to be very hard. I feel like I might lose it. But they are very kind and have taken Tanner’s loss hard too. They love my pugs. I called Saturday morning after Tanner had died the night before and told them what had happened. When Dr. Dixon got into the office on Tuesday and got the news she called me right away. She said that she was so shocked that when they told her Tanner had died she had said, “No, you must mean Pugsley?” She couldn’t believe it was Tanner. Today I go there to get sweet Pugsley’s prescription, it is a controlled substance and must be rewritten monthly. Of course I will go.

It is overcast today, and breezy. I did go out last night after I fed the babies their dinner and planted a number of things in the pots on the deck. There is more to plant and I will do so a little each day over the next few days. The rose I was rooting is planted. The bleeding hearts that will one day be planted over Tanner’s grave but need to grow on a little and get bigger and stronger are planted. Phlox, many bulbs. Everything else I need to get planted are bulbs or tubers. Then I will plant seeds. It will probably take me a week to get it all planted but a little each day will get it done. Just now I am finishing my coffee and will soon get dressed and go by the vet’s office and the pharmacy. The sun is peeking through the clouds and Siri tells me on my iPhone that it will be a sunny afternoon. Birds are coming steadily to the feeders, cardinals, the woodpecker couple, mourning doves, so many more, and the squirrels too. The big trash truck just came noisily down the street as it does. Life goes on, and so must I.

One day at a time, one loss at a time, the first week passes. I must close the other doors on every other kind of imagined loss or fear. I cannot handle everything at once, and I don’t need to. This day getting Pugsley’s medication and planting a few more bulbs will be enough.