Year of the Loss
It feels like an eternity, but it is has been just weeks since I lost my dog, Ginger. The whole family lost her, actually, but more than any other pet I've had, I really felt like Ginger belonged to me. I belonged to her.
Ginger, March 30, 1996 - May 5, 2010
Since I moved back to my parent's house in Winder, Ginger became primarily my responsibility. In the beginning, it just meant making sure she was fed and spending a little time with her each day. Last summer, it meant bringing her inside in the afternoons and letting her sleep or pace around my room while I worked, so she could get a break from the heat and I could have a little company. Soon after that it meant anticipating when she needed to go out, and cleaning up after her when I missed the window. I cleaned up after her a lot, and so did my parents.
Ginger started getting stuck in the bushes and groves of bamboo scattered around the yard, and I had to go out at all hours, from early in the morning to after midnight, to untangle her from whatever briar she'd gotten herself snagged in. This started happening several times every week. She'd bark and bark until I went to get her out, over time I became tuned in to that bark, so I could hear it even when I had the TV or loud music on.
Everyone kept insisting it was time to put Ginger down. I balked at the idea. Ginger still lived the life of a dog until she was near her natural end: she ate, she walked around the yard, she enjoyed spending time with her humans. As an old dog—a dog with incontinence problems, a dog who made a huge mess when she ate, a dog who walked into corners and behind couches and then couldn't figure out how to walk backwards and get herself out, a dog that couldn't get up or down a flight of stairs without significant risk of falling—Ginger was an enormous hassle to deal with in her old age. In her younger days, however, Ginger had been super low maintenance—she was born housebroken, it seems, and she was easy to train— and throughout her life she was a great friend to me. Ginger was with me for all my lonely teen years. There were so many times when I thought no one liked me, but Ginger always loved me. She was always my friend. She didn't judge me for being socially awkward, she didn't make jokes at my expense, and she was the one creature on this earth who was there for me no matter what. She was never mad, never cold, never moody. I could count on her to listen, to keep secrets, and to always try to cheer me up.
The day she died she had stopped walking. If I could get her standing she would just fall right over, barking at me the whole time. It had been raining hard for days previous and she was covered in mud. Every time I pulled her out of one swampy puddle she fell in another one. Luckily the rain had stopped and it was hot that day. I pulled her into the back yard and gave her one last bath, cleaned her all up, dried her off and brought her inside, laying her down on a palette I'd prepared. She barked and barked at me, flailing her head, urging me to find some way to make her feel better. I kept repositioning her, and she'd be good for 2 or 3 minutes, and then she'd start barking again, in a yelping, staccato way. I was alone in the house with her all afternoon and evening, and I actually had one of those surreal experiences where I found myself yelling at her, sobbing, wishing she could just tell me what was wrong with her!
When my parents got home from work, Mom was able to get some fluids in her with a medicine dropper that Dad bought for the occasion, and Ginger calmed down. We called Sarah on speakerphone, and as a family decided Ginger was clearly in a lot of pain and we'd put her down in the morning. I spent some time with her. I took off her collar and gently cleaned her face. I told her she was a good dog and was special to me. I went to bed after midnight but couldn't sleep. I checked on her every hour. When I went down to check on her at 5 AM, she was gone.
I hear Ginger barking all the time, trying to get me to come outside and free her from whatever bramble she's stuck in. Every night I get an impulse to bring her in to feed her at the regular time, and a few times I've opened up the door before I could stop myself, to find an empty porch. I gave away her food and treats, but when Mom moved Ginger's bowl from the kitchen not long ago I just about lost it.
Of course, for all the detailed drama, for as much as it has wrecked me, the death of Ginger will probably amount to a tiny crisis in what is turning into the most stressful, bereft season of my life. After bouncing between rehab, the hospital, the ICU in the hospital, and finally landing in a hospice house, my grandfather, who has been more or less confined to a bed since losing a leg to complications of diabetes, is now finally at home, basically waiting to die. We had been told that he had just days, but now it looks like he has some months, and the challenge is to continue to provide him with 24 hour care on a limited budget.
The good news is, my grandfather, DadDad, seems happy. Content, even. The bad news is no one knows what is happening one day to the next, and the stress and uncertainty of it all is taking a toll on everyone. I feel more lonely and more alone than I have felt in a long time. A long time. Maybe it's because Ginger is gone, maybe it's because I'm geographically a bit far from most of my friends, or maybe it's that I work alone all day. It is, of course, some combination of all of those and more things I'm not directly conscious of.
I'm just starting to get this feeling swelling up in me where I wonder, when is someone going to take care of me? When is is going to be my turn to be all flimsy and unreliable? I definitely am starting to feel like I'm only here to run errands, make phone calls, and clean house. I'm happy to do all that, but I'm beginning feel less like a part of a family and more like hired help. When I need someone to talk to, everyone is too tired or too busy or too much on their way out the door. I would feel a lot less alone if I actually was alone.
