Ginger

I watched my neighbor today scoop her puppy off the roadway. It was an accident that ended one precious life and broke the heart of another. She carried her baby home in her arms—never minding the mess. My two girls watched with me from the window, and we were all so sad. So far it had been a typical Sunday morning; it quickly became atypical. I was reminded about how abruptly some lives come into ours. Unexpectedly. Unintentionally. And, perhaps, unnecessarily. Those are atypical days too. These lives arrive in small, whimpering packages—totally helpless and speechless. They slobber. They lick. They shed. They grow. The fuzzy hair becomes a fine coat. The body catches up with the floppy ears and wiry legs. As they grow in strength and stature, they simultaneously grow into our hearts. We teach them to be housetrained, and crate-trained, and leash-trained. They teach us how to hear what they are saying through their big brown eyes, wet noses, and nudges. If we try, we learn lessons about complete devotion and unconditional love without a word ever being uttered. We can’t say when or where, but at some point on this journey the two hearts are combined, and we don’t consider eternity or mortality or the brevity of each life. Instead we live each day as if today will the same as the next ten thousand and no one will grow old or get sick or die. It’s a defense mechanism, you know, because to dwell on the inevitable would get in the way of the living and the loving. But, just as abruptly as they arrive, they also leave. Unexpectedly. Unintentionally. And, perhaps, unnecessarily. On any given morning, while the sun is shining, and the family gathers, and coffee is brewing, the typical day becomes atypical as they slip away as abruptly as they came. And we are helpless, speechless, whimpering packages of broken hearts because of the time we shared and the love we learned from a little furry insignificant life that came, lived, loved, and left.