I wish we had a better place for dogs to die into. The Christian bible gives us no afterlife for them, no dog paradise where we can imaginatively park them forever in the bliss they deserve, and so park our pain. But we want them to go to heaven, so much that we imply as much to our weeping children when the family dog passes from old age. We inch with a high hand into heresy, for the sake of love. Why can’t they live with us forever? It seems unjust that they would not. In our secret hearts, where our actual theologies live, we believe they merit eternal life more than we do.
60 or more years, can you believe it? 60 years since I lost Sambo, my black dog, who loved me and watched for me when I’d walk up our road from the 1st grade bus stop. He would stand on his hind legs, paws up on my shoulders, panting on my nose, and we’d dance some sort of welcome dance. This picture, him as tall as me, breath in my face, is Sambo, forever in my mind.
I say “lost “ but the truth is my parents left him behind when we moved to yet another house. I’m still not sure why, and the truth is… it has bothered me now for 60 years. An itch that can’t be scratched, this feeling that my mom and dad just moved us away and abandoned Sambo on the empty road, wagging his tail, waiting for me to come walking up from the bus stop.
He’s gone, they’re gone. And my one and only bone to pick with mom and dad has to wait for my own walk into their undiscovered country where, maybe, mom and dad and Sambo sit together on a sunlit porch.