About My Death.

Hi! Long time no write. We have a different sense of time up here (we move very fast) so a few minutes to us is years to you.)
Anyway Mrs. Stillman wrote a piece about when I died so I thought I would share with you. Here it is:

Christmas 

I hated the new apartment. It was so small it could’ve fit into the living room of the big beautiful house I had just sold. The rooms were tiny, too tiny for an art studio. I’m an artist but I couldn’t paint there. I felt I couldn’t do anything there. My future looked empty. I had lost everything, my savings, my career, my dog.  I was lost.   I was defeated. 

I decided to adopt another dog, friends told me that would help. I adopted Libby who had been rescued from a terrible puppy mill.  She couldn’t speak or bark. The mill had destroyed her vocal chords on purpose. That’s what they do.  But Libby could think, and love, and make me smile. Libby wanted to write about her life

as an unpaid worker, breeding, in a puppy mill. So, I channeled her thoughts for her and we made a puppy log blog called a Plog.

. She wrote silly poetry, something I would never dare do, and she drew pictures to illustrate her stories. They were pretty good for a dog, nothing like my pictures. She invented recipes for cat pie and squirrel cake. And as we collaborated, Libby taught me things about me that I never knew.  Libby made me live again.

One Christmas eve, after a few happy years of living and working together, we were hanging out on the living room sofa watching the snow fall through the glow under the streetlights I noticed that Libby seemed to be breathing pretty fast.it worried me but I told myself, she’s just panting like she often does. I didn’t want to leave the warm, comfy place we were in. And it looked so cold out there. So, I told myself it would be okay. I thought her breathing was slowing down as we drifted off to sleep, right there on the soft pillows of the sofa.

On Christmas morning the snow was coming down much harder. Poor Libby was breathing very fast. I knew should have called last night, but it was so cold out and we were so cozy. But I should have called. I should have. I grabbed the phone and called Cornell Veterinary School:




“Is this an emergency?

On holidays we only take emergencies.”

“I think so. My dog is breathing very fast.”

“I see. That could be very serious.  Bring her in right away.”

  

I bundled her up in baby blankets and made my way through the snow up the long hill to Cornell.  They took her in immediately. I called after them, "she wasn’t this bad last night." The doors swung shut behind them. I waited. 




When they asked me in for consultation, they talked and talked in euphemistic circles about possible actions to take before finally saying to me what I already realized.

"It would be very hard on her to go through all that."

"I know."

"The best thing would be to....”

“Yes, yes, I understand. Can I just see her one last time?”

“Her lungs are filled with fluid. It’s probably lung cancer

We put her in an oxygen tent and gave her morphine to make     her more comfortable, She is heavily drugged, but I will bring  her out.”

I waited in the tiny featureless examination room for my Libby. When I held her in my arms her head lolled back, her tongue hung out, and her eyes were blank. She didn't know me. It hurt me so much that I gave her back right away. Much too soon,

What could I do with her? I knew I couldn't bury her in the frozen ground, so I made a quick decision to escape my pain. I told them to keep her. They carried her away. My life went with her. I walked through the cinderblock corridors, down the antiseptic halls, past the empty waiting room, and out into the cold lonely snow. I left the hospital without my baby, my muse, my inspiration, alone.




Of all the deaths that I have endured; my mom, my dad, others.   Libby's was the worst, the hardest to accept, the one loaded with ifs and guilt. The one I still feel, physically, in my stomach, my throat, my shoulders, my heart.

Libby’s is the one I still feel. The only one.