The signs of fall are all around us, which means that there are reminders everywhere that spring leads to summer and summer to fall – with cold, seemingly lifeless winter right around the corner. I love the story that those seasons tell and retell, year after year. . . that all things change, that death is inextricably woven into life, but that rebirth can happen when we least expect it. When people retire to places like Florida and Arizona, I used to think that it was mostly to avoid the nightmare of blizzards and snow-blowing and tire chains and all else that makes Wisconsin Winter such a trial. But I wonder more and more if at least some of those Florida transplants move there to escape the drama of changing seasons so they are confronted by one less reminder that our time on earth is brief… one less reminder that we are like the flowers that fade away, to quote the Apostle Paul.
Those reminders come not only in the turning of the seasons. They also come when you own and love a pet. My thoughts tonight are with two people very very near and dear to Kathy and me (I don’t feel right using their names without their permission) who earlier this evening had to have one of their beloved dogs put to sleep. I know they are feeling terrible anguish tonight; Kathy and I tasted that very same anguish ourselves several years ago when we decided to have our cocker spaniel Luther put to sleep. It’s a loss that not everyone can grasp and appreciate, which is why you hesitate to share it with too many people. . . which can make it a lonelier sort of loss.
Which brings to mind something I heard from a beloved Carthage professor of religion named Dudley Riggle – perhaps the single most cherished member of the Carthage family in recent memory. I once heard him explain that the word “understand” was coined from the notion of literally standing under someone else – or standing directly in their footprints, in order to know exactly where they stand, what they see, and most importantly, what they think and feel. It is to literally put ourselves in someone else’s place. It is to say “I have been where you are – I have tasted what you are tasting right now. I understand.” Those last two words are easily said and we probably tend to say them far too often – and many times say them when in fact we don’t understand at all what someone is experiencing or feeling. We perhaps want to but can’t – or maybe won’t. It makes you realize what a gift it is to truly understand someone else and the hurt which they are suffering. Not that you can take away their hurt – or even lessen it – but at least you can remind them that they are not alone and that someone has known the same pain.
I felt so powerless yesterday when I heard this news- and even more so when I realized that my schedule at school would make it tricky for me to help out with some emergency babysitting while this difficult trip to the vet’s office was made by the mom and dad. Eventually, I did the only thing I could think of doing- I went to Hallmark. I picked out a card that said something about Love and Loss. I scrawled a very few words that conveyed how deeply sorry Kathy and I were about their loss. And I dropped it off at their house, so that when they got home that evening from that long trip to the vet, they would know that someone was grieving with them. . . that someone knows what this pain feels like. . . that someone understands. . .
One the surface, it was nothing. Just a card. But really it’s everything. It is the precious gift of understanding. These two did the same sort of thing for us when Luther was put to sleep. And the last night Luther was alive, Kate Barrow actually came to our house to say a long, tearful goodbye to our beautiful cocker spaniel. She’s a dog owner and has tasted this sorrow herself more than once. She understood.
Nothing makes us more human – more alive – than this.
pictured above: a remarkably beautiful fall scene from Petrifying Springs. I feel like this picture could adorn the cover of a children’s book. And at the very center of the photograph, if you look very very carefully, is a tiny patch of blue and brown. The blue is actually Kathy- and the brown is our golden retriever Bobbi.