The summer of pet funerals

Crash died back at the end of June.

He’d been sick for a few months. A lengthy vet visit, several tests and an expensive bill told us that he had either liver disease, cancer or both and unless we could afford to continue investigating through more lengthy visits and hefty bills, we needed to consider putting him down.

Turns out, we didn’t have to make the decision. He passed away one night, peacefully we hope, underneath our bed, while we were asleep.

He came to live with us six years ago after the vet had revived him from a near-fatal car accident. We’ve never known how old he was or even how many lives he might have had before he slowly won Shaune’s heart those few weeks he was in a crate, up for adoption after the vet had sewn him up. At the time, our dog’s diabetes had us at the clinic twice a week to pick up small vials of insulin.

We lost our dog several months later. He was 11. He’d been with me since he was eight weeks old.

I was grateful to have Crash close-by,  his rabbit-soft fur felt so good through my fingers those long grief-filled months after Judge died. I was inconsolable, could no longer even drive down the streets we’d walked him, watching episode after episode of The Dog Whisperer which I found strangely comforting. I was pregnant with Deaglan then, unaware of the change my life would take once a human baby came into it.

I think poor Crash never got the attention he deserved from me. I’ve been so busy these last five years, my lap hardly ever empty. I take comfort in knowing Shaune adored him, thought about his well-being constantly, lovingly, the way we had with Judge before children came and consumed all of our attention.

When he finally found the cat, that summer morning, Shaune ran downstairs to find me, sipping coffee, both kids on my lap. I saw something in his face, something he didn’t have to explain and made up an excuse as to why I had to run upstairs for a second with Daddy. Our king sized bed was pulled out from the wall, revealing missing toys, pacifiers, mismatched socks, and Crash amidst it all, laying on his side, his teeth exposed in a strange almost grisly way.

We’d been readying Deaglan for weeks of our cat's death, had explained that it could happen any time and that once it did, Crash would go immediately to heaven. And yet, nothing could really prepare him for it because when we told him, he cried for days. He began missing Judge too, who he’d actually never met – I was five months pregnant with him when we lost our dog.  For a few weeks he would recall stories of things he and Judge did together.

It was odd and endearing.

About a month ago, we noticed the cleaning fish, the one we got specifically to keep the tank that sits on the boys’ dresser clear of algae – we noticed he was dead. No one had even thought to name him. Shaune and I simply referred to him as The Cleaner even though we were convinced no one had ever explained this function to him, the proof being a tank that was constantly green and slimy, despite our attempts to clear it with different solutions the pet store recommended.

When we told Deaglan he was devastated. 

We took our places, consoling him, reminding him that he’d likely joined Crash and Judge and Grandma Mac and Uncle Matt up in heaven. And still, every few days he tells us how terribly he misses the fish – the one we can’t even refer to by name.

So, you can imagine how sick I am at the thought of telling our four year old of our latest casualties: that last Wednesday morning his Dad discovered his other two fish – the ones with names – Toopy and Binoo,  dead. They'd outlived all of our expectations: three full years, enormous, fluid and shiny. Imagine how grateful I am that the tank is murky enough from the Cleaner’s absence to not yet be noticed. 

Dread fills me every day we don't tell the kids. I know too well a four year old curiosity - the demand to see the dead bodies, ask a million times how it happened. 

This weekend I've been holed away studying for a final exam - I'm taking some industry related courses for work. Shaune took the kids to a bee farm yesterday and to an apple/pumpkin farm today. These pictures were taken this afternoon.

Sinister smiles

Eating apples yet unpaid for.

Finding just the right pumkin

Swinging

Tonight Deaglan was gaining major momentum on the swing in our backyard. I put my foot down a few weeks ago and refused to push him every single time; I reminded him that he knew how to do it himself. Frankly, it was cutting into my Facebook time.

I mean wasn’t it enough that I was out there “watching” him and his brother play?

So there we were, Deaglan swinging, Naveen climbing, and me browsing when out of the blue Deaglan asks if he will go to Heaven when he dies. It doesn’t faze me though - it’s a carryover conversation from last week when I thought the cat wasn’t coming home from his two day stint at the vet. At the time I felt compelled to prep Deaglan for the worst, explain that Crash might die. But the cat ended up pulling through – turns out he had an abscess in his mouth where he’d lost a tooth. The vet rehydrated him, pumped him full of antibiotics and for 600 bucks sent him on his way with a prescription for morphine, more antibiotics and pricey canned food.

So when Deaglan asked me tonight if he’d go to Heaven after he died, I looked up from the Blackberry tablet and answered without skipping a beat:

“Yup.”

“But how will I get there?”

“You’ll float.”

“What about my skin, will my skin go to Heaven?”

“No, your body won’t go, that’s the part that gets buried, remember?” He’s flying on that swing now. I notice he really needs a haircut.

“UNDER the ground? Even my feet?” His face is fascination and worry.

“Listen,” I say, “when you die, your body stops working. You don’t walk or talk anymore. You don’t need to eat; you don’t have to go to school.”

“But Mommy, I don’t want to die. What about my PARENTS? I don’t want to leave my PARENTS!”

“You won’t die for a long, long time and besides Mommy and Daddy will die way before you.” Lord help me.

Sharp intake of breath and furrowed brows but still soaring. “YOU'RE going to die?”

“No, no, not for a long, long time. Please, you don’t have to worry honey, just keep swinging.”

Naveen is now tired of going head first down the slide and is swinging from a wooden beam on the playscape. Shaune’s right, this kid’s gonna  keep us on the edge of our seats, show up with a motorcycle when he’s fourteen.

I don’t know what else to say about dying.

I know his four year old mind is trying to sort out the logistics, but I never had a plan for this conversation except that I like the idea of Heaven. I like the idea of God. I really like the idea of this not being all there is.

Once in a while he mentions Uncle Matt, reminds me that my brother died and is in Heaven. I’m always oddly grateful. It’s nice not to be the one to have to bring him up, to share a memory out loud even if it’s with a four year old who barely knew him.

I interrupt our talk so I can devise ways to lure Naveen down. It’s enough, all this talk of dying. Thank goodness Deaglan thinks so too.

How to ease Christmas nausea

At Costco last weekend there were two and a half aisles of Christmas stuff. I guess it’s just an unwritten rule that stores wait till Halloween is over before displaying it. And because it was a hot October day, not even Canadian Thanksgiving yet, I felt like I was in my still decorated living room on January first; nauseous at the sight of it.

The kids were with me and Deaglan asked for every single toy we passed. At first I tried silence but that didn’t fly. After saying no a few times, I finally told him he’d have to ask Santa for them.

Sheesh.

I’ve written before that this time of year always leaves me churning a little; I’m not sure how to embrace it because the commercial idea of Christmas makes me sick. With small kids though, it’s hard not to get sucked in.

But because I feel a responsibility to raise my kids’ awareness that we live a very cozy life, we don’t know the meaning of need, hunger or suffering, I’ve been chipping away at teaching Deaglan about the people who do. We bought a globe at the beginning of the summer at a garage sale. Many an afternoon we’ve laid together on his bed naming different countries.

I’ve told him about Bangladesh where I’m from, about the kids there, how they don’t have much to eat, that their parents can’t afford to buy toys. I’ve found myself breathing sighs of relief when his concerned little face came up with ways to help those kids.

Every so often I show him the picture of Sabina, our sponsored child, remind him that her life is very different from ours. I tell him that we are sharing some of our money so that we can help her and her family have a better life. And always during these brief talks, he thinks of ways we can share other things with her, mostly his toys.

And even though I know he doesn’t quite get it, I see that just bringing it up does us all good - gets us thinking about something outside of ourselves.

Last week I decided to accept the Visa my bank was offering and close my extra MasterCard. The exchange meant I’d have to contact World Vision to change my account information – put our monthly donation to Sabina’s family on the Visa now. It got me thinking about how we never ever notice that money being gone.

What’s $35 to us?

I called Shaune at work and asked him how he’d feel about adding another child to our account. I’m happy to say we are now helping three year old Keerthana and her family in Sri Lanka.

And just like that, I’m not dreading this Christmas season - as much.

My kids are biracial

My friend Sue saw this picture of Deaglan in our front hall and said

“Oh look how cute you were when you were little!”

I had to hold back my urge to kiss her. On the mouth. It would have complicated things between us. And I’m not sure she’d want to visit again.
And I’m embarrassed to tell you that my heart leapt in delight. It took a great deal of self-control to refrain from sitting her down to obtain a feature-by-feature comparison, demanding she outline in detail, exactly where she felt the similarities lay.

I don’t have any pictures of myself before the age of seven. I’ve written about all that before: being adopted from Bangladesh, the orphanage, my birth mother. But the thing is, when you have no point of reference like a baby photo or more importantly, someone who knew you as a baby to say, yes, your children do in fact resemble you, well having someone suggest this, is nothing short of finding a fifty dollar bill in an old jacket pocket.

This not having my birth parents around to affirm my likeness to my kids isn’t the only part of being adopted that weighs on me as a parent. I wonder all the time how and when to tell my boys about the other half of their ancestry. Shaune brings with him a clan of beautiful family to make his birthright come alive for our boys. Gramma and Grampa are a steady part of Deaglan and Naveen’s lives so that they will naturally learn about their paternal roots. I’m so grateful for that. And of course my parents, Mimi and Papa, can fill them in on my life after the age of seven.

But I lived in Bangladesh for long enough that it’s more than the place I was born. I knew my biological parents, spent the most formative years of my childhood being influenced by severe poverty, a deeply entrenched Muslim faith, and even a completely different language. I want the kids to appreciate that, learn from it, and as a result, become conscious of the rest of the world. I hope they someday realize how lucky they were, being born into abundance, hope it enriches them in a way that will see them grow up to become kind, humble and tolerant men.

I don’t have the right answer. I certainly don't want to see the day when I hear them say “yeah, yeah, yeah, we get it; you walked five miles to school, in the snow with no shoes.”

I’m pouring my heart out with Shell.

Letting myself off the hook

Monday morning right after his second bowl of Cheerios and only a half hour before he said he was starving again, Deaglan looked over at me and asked Mommy are you missing Uncle Matt?

Just like that.
Out of the clear blue sky.

I haven't told him that my brother is gone from here. Even writing that makes me ache. I don't see the point in telling a three year old what that means. I honestly don't know if he has the capacity to comprehend. It stressed me out though, this small earthly boy asking such a cosmic question.

All at once I felt like Atlas with that crushing globe on his shoulder. Burdened. Ever have one of those moments? Where you felt puny? Inadequate? 

But I focused.
Didn't fall apart.
Didn't choke back tears.

Soberly I looked at my first born and said yes I do, I miss him all the time. And you know the blanket of comfort that three foot wonder wrapped me in? It's okay Mommy, we'll go visit his house and you'll feel better.  

I left it
right there.

Then I pushed the door to my psyche open a crack and tossed this in with all the the other junk I'm not ready to deal with. Even still, I caught a glimpse of all that other stuff and I reeled a little. 

I steadied myself on the smooth cool arm of the recliner.

Questions sliced through the spacey parts of my throat where the knot had formed. How I will ever convey all the things I want them to know? Carry with them.  

Like my ocean-sized love for my brother.  My heartache that he didn't meet my little Naveen. That I can't taste cold chardonnay or chocolate peanut butter balls  without hearing  his laugh.

I hugged him last Easter with my tiny boy growing snugly inside, burgeoning. I said I can't wait to get home and put on my comfy pants. And he laughed a light little laugh and cautiously patted my belly. I never saw him again.

The depth of such
an undertaking, to precisely depict Matthew, who he was to me,
a medley of pluck and slight,
threatened to swallow me.

So I left it
right there,
And I forgave myself, reasoning these could be matters for another day.

This is my entry for The Red Dress Club's prompt forgiveness.