What is it about an immutably doomed relationship that compels us to throw our entire hearts and souls into its sad sad conclusion without any of the defensive mechanisms we use to protect ourselves from situations that have a chance of ending semi-happily? I'm talking, of course, about pet ownership.
I grew up in rural North Carolina where animals were treated as animals. My brother and I went through an almost unrecountable litany of pets. I can think of at least five dogs we buried in the garden plot next to the house; two teenage boys with shovels, burying another car-struck stray we had picked up at the dump. There was always another dog. We got them from grandparents, uncles, older brother's girlfriends, the dump, sheer fate and chance. None lasted very long.
When I was eleven, playing basketball one February Sunday, I saw my dog get shot as it ran across a neighbor's field. I just happened to look up at the wrong time. I never saw the gunman, but my mom and I retrieved the body and buried it. Another dog was poisoned. Two died of parvo. One, a beagle, was attacked and killed by a roving pack of other dogs. It wasn't just dogs. Kittens would disappear or get hit by cars. We had two "bitties" (baby chicks) that were eaten by a snake. I had a piglet that froze to death in the warm bed I had made for him.
I was told by my parents never to cry over an animal. Dogs die, they said. It is sad, but one does not let grief get you over a simple mutt. Oh, but I did cry. I have cried over the death of dogs in ways I have never grieved for my human peers. I would hide it of course. I'd cry in bed, at night, quiet and mourning with the radio on for cover. I'd sob like a lunatic in the shower, sitting on the floor with my knees by my face, weeping real tears punctuated by real moans that remained hidden in the noisy depths of what was the "shower of mourning." I never got used to it. I buried dogs I never even petted, mean dogs who would appear for months at a time and carefully rip food away from my friendly hand, growling the whole time. I buried these with the beloved pets and cried real tears over each.
I read somewhere that the death of a pet decreases, permanently, your capacity for happiness. I believe this. We always got new dogs when our old ones died (or were killed), and each time, we threw ourselves without reserve into this new puppy. It got a name, food, taught tricks, a collar, flea and tick medicine, and more affection than I would have thought possible in my mourning periods. However, something remains after they go. Not a ghost, but a hole. A knowledge perhaps of the grief that is to be the fruits of your love. And that is a happiness-diminishing fact.
I might add - go home tonight and wrap your cat or dog in your arms and give him or her a lot of ots favorite treat. They are not long enough for this world and it is our job to sacrifice a bit of our soul to keeping that time safe and happy.
I might also add that I own no pets today. I'm not over the last one. Not yet.
