Yesterday the dog died.  Collateral damage.  When a neighbor peered in my window she saw carseats stuffed with impatient children and behind them, a drooling, panting dog. She told me I had to better plan the arrivals of vehicles at my house to avoid too many polluting diesel engines, ruined her concentration, creativity. I didn’t care. I had to euthanize Metro.  I lost it.  Told her to mind her own business. No I didn’t I just rolled up my window and drove on.

Metro is gone.  Just gone.  I can’t believe it. He’s dead, Buddy.  And I did it, my horse vet helped.  The neighbor has no idea how much I’d been fucked with that day.  No idea. And I had to take charge of SOMETHING.  What a life I have here.  I am unraveling.  Loosely wound and barely knitted together at all.  I am so sorry.  I failed my sense of what’s right.  Copped out. Murdered my dog.  He’d peed on my shoes daily, barked in the middle of the night scratched up the doors, wrecked the kids toys, awakened me every twenty minutes for the last few nights from 2 am on.  He’d gone nuts. He never recalled eating. Carried his dish around in his mouth.

But now his soft little ears, his sweet beagle eyes and doggie-ness is gone. His nutsy is gone too. I can never forget the cute  guy who stood on the porch looking in blankly as if to say, why am I out? then slapped at the door with a paw, claw digging into the painted surface again and again. Or howled as the children slept.  I hopped out of bed to maintain the sleep of those kids, of utmost importance; too important.  Crazy important.

I told you that Doctor Chuck had to examine him.  Look at his tumors and maybe he’d not come home.  He didn’t.

Where did Metro go?  You ask. To the vet, hoping that was it.  But will he come back?  No, I tell you.  Does he have a new home?  No.  I read you Dog Heaven. Grandma, you ask, as it dawns on you, is Metro dead? Yes he is.  Did he die now?  Yes.  Right now?  Yes.  He is dead. I am sorry, honey.  You cry.  I really miss him. Me too, I tell you.  We cry for a couple minutes and then you say, can dead things come back home? No.  Is he extinct?  Yes. But there are still dogs on our planet. We have Georgis. But nothing will be like Metro, even other beagles. Metro is no longer alive. Dogs still live.  Not actually extinct. Then, you suggest, lets’ get another Metro with soft ears.

After Echo. VACATION: 8/20/2011-9/5/2011  You write him a letter. “Dear Metro, I’m sad you died.  I loved your soft ears.  They were soft as the kitty. I am a little glad you aren’t here anymore because you keeped eating my food.  You used to play and pull on toys with your teeth.  You looked cute today in the car with your chin on the seat.  You liked to snuggle with stuffed animals.  I miss you.  I miss your stinkiness and your snoring all the time.  I loved you, Metro.”

I awakened on Metro time.  At 2, 2:30 and then again at 3 and 3:40 and finally got up at 5:20. Yesterday Liza got up at 2 am and wanted to eat.  Jeeze.   Metro incarnate? She was so determined.  I cried.

Today was day 1 year 1 PM.  Post Metro.  I should have slipped his soft ears into my bag.  Brought his body home.  But I left it.  We bought him a tree.  No dogwood available, so we chose a magnolia with buds as soft as his ears.  He won’t help it grow, but his spirit will.  My morning was quiet.  The grinding noise I thought was him was the refrigerator, the stink, Georgia, the sand on the floor, not him and the pee on the shoes?  It was Liza.  She peed on day one right in my shoe.  Just like Metro used to do.  Does Metro now inhabit her?  So weird.  I wash them off, like always and think I hear him scratching the gate, and knock over the trash, but its not him, its the dog next door, come visiting.  Was it always that dog? Oh dear.  I am off center.  Reek of guilt.

Yesterday you made some toast all by yourself.  And wanted cinnamon on it.  I made a mixture of two teaspoons sugar and some cinnamon for your to sprinkle and left the house.  Minutes later the house poured smoke, you cried, a fan started up to blow out the smoke because you poured the sugar into the hot toaster and pushed it down, started a fire and ran outside. You were scared.  Me too.

Daddy and Mom came by and sat and stared.  They lost their rental.  Don’t know what to do. Neither do I.  I told them if they wanted a favor to figure out what they were doing first.  To ask for two nights in a bed or three or a week.  But make a plan and understand that the favor would be just for awhile until…what?  No favors until there’s a plan.  And they left.  I don’t know where they went.  Worry. Guilt, Worry Cycle

Think about euthanasia.  Think about the control one can have over situations.  The responsibility.  And have to focus on you.  That’s all I can do.  Or is it?

This is a shitty moment.  I hate it.  Good night, little Edmontasaurus baby.  Goodnight Liza. gma

GOODNIGHT SWEET PUP.  WE’LL MISS YOU AT ECHO THIS YEAR.