It's been more than a week now (9 days to be exact) since we lost "The Best Dog That Ever Lived," our boy Kip.



It's been a very hard week emotionally for both of us.

Some people think a man who cries is weak. Not so. In my opinion, a man who cries, especially because he has lost a beloved pet, is the best kind of human being alive. My Paul is one of those men. I haven't seen him cry like this since I've known him. I have done my share of uncontrolled sobbing, too, but Paul has just been hit so hard by this unexpected loss of our golden boy, Kip.

Anyway, yesterday I went the whole day, for the first time in a while, without crying. Today, I've already had three episodes of it, so maybe I'm making up for it now. But each day, I'm hoping, it will get easier.

I set about to make a memorial framed picture grouping of our Kippie boy, and here it is, hanging centered over the sofa in the living room. The pawprints were included in a sympathy card that our new veterinarian and staff sent to us, presumably made by the staff at the crematorium. A nice touch, and I'm so thankful they did it.



Closer up:



I printed off one of those pictures of him sitting under the (now gone) burning bushes out front:



It's one of my favorite pictures of him. He was such a beautiful dog, both on the outside and on the inside.

I'm sure there are some people who would disagree with the "inside" part, but they didn't "know" him like we did. They would be the various people who would walk by the house and get barked at... all the way from one end of the property to the other until they were well out of sight... and even for a minute afterwards...

It wasn't as if Kip wanted to harm them; in fact, he really just was saying hello and asking them to come closer so they could get acquainted, but it must have sounded otherwise to some people, especially those who had their own dogs with them! When Kip saw a dog going by, he went berserk! I could not control his barking. Paul could, but I couldn't. I was always the softie in Kip's life... the one who gave in and spoiled him.

We have a neighbor who didn't like Kip at all (?) and who, when Kip barked at him, would actually go inside his house and get one of those nasty, horrid air-horns that they use on boats, and he pointed it at Kip and it would blare out that loud, loud noise at him (and anyone else around within hearing distance). It was totally rude and crude... and it would make Kip bark even more! So it did no good. It was just a way to aggravate him and us. Not a good thing.



Above, another picture of Kip and Emmalee that we got back from Paul's folks when they passed away last year. They loved their "grand-dogs" very much and wanted a framed picture of them nearby in the nursing facility where they lived. Behind this picture is the one I painted of our long-ago Great Pyrenees dog, Esmeralda, from a picture of her I took on our wedding day in Marblehead. Below is the original photograph:



So, 9 days have gone by. Kip is "living," or should I say residing, in the front room that I now call "Kip's Room," in his beautiful cedar box. There is no TV in there, and no computers. There is a radio/cd player that I listen to a lot and the front windows that look out onto the garden in the front of the house. We are still feeding the birds with the suet blocks and they are happy birds in our garden... that's for sure.

So I'm heading out now to Kip's Room to have a little visit with him, chat about things, tell him again how much I love him and always will, and generally let out a little emotion that is getting built up whilst writing this entry...



I hope to move on to more normal topics soon. But it does take a while. I'm not quite ready for prime time yet... (not that I ever was!)

Pretty quiet out there now...



Cheers,

Bex & Co.

I think I could turn and live with animals...
They are so placid and self-contained,
I stand and look at them sometimes half the day long.

They do not sweat and whine about their condition,
They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins,
They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God,
Not one is dissatisfied... not one is demented with the mania of owning things,
Not one kneels to another nor to his kind that lived thousands of years ago,
Not one is respectable or industrious over the whole earth.

~ [Walt Whitman, from "Leaves of Grass, No. 32"] ~

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