Of Death and Other Things

Today as I was working on my final self portrait project for my life drawing class, I decided I wanted to make a pained/crying expression to draw. When I tried faking it, or making myself look like I was crying, it just didn't look genuine at all. I couldn't draw it because there was no reality to it. For the most part I just looked as if I was really angry about something.

So I decided to watch films I knew made me cry so that it would be real. One I decided to watch because it makes me sob every time is this one video on youtube. It's a short documentary about an ex-convict who has a 3-legged dog that changed his life. Tragically the dog is going to be put down, so the director filmed the man's last hours with his beloved friend. This video just made me think of my past dog.

I had a dog named Sugar who was already old when he received her. She was a rather grumpy dog who liked to get her way. Sugar wasn't the nicest to me, but I still loved her more than anything because she was MY dog. My first dog, too. That video made me think of my last hours with her. I remember she was really sick for a while. Her tummy got jaundiced and she bloated up. She could still function, but was becoming slower, and slower. It was painful to see her rapid decline, but we didn't treat her any differently. We still showered her with as much love as possible.

But I remember the last night with my dog. Everything was going fine, but when Sugar went into the backyard to do her duty, she saw a cat and decided she was healthy enough to go chasing it. She collapsed mid run. When my mom frantically brought her back into the house, Sugar could hardly walk. We all looked at each other sadly, all knowing that this was basically the end. I sat all night with her. Sugar could not walk so she we put her in a basket full of blankets to keep her warm. She stayed with me too. Part of me thinks she knew this was her last night with us as well.

Sadly I had to go to school the next day, as much as I wanted to be with her at the end. I broke down crying in the middle of my math class and decided to step out, and miss most of my next class as well. I kept thinking about how one night Sugar was there with us, at the door when we come home, sat by me when I'm on the couch, or laid down relaxing in her stinky leopard print bed....and yet tonight when I got home she would no longer be there. Its an unnerving feeling, sitting with something you know is going no longer going to be around the next day. To sit there with her, knowing that we would have to put her down tomorrow, that we have to put her out of her misery, is a terrible thing. It made me think, why are we the ones to decide when it's an animal's time to pass? I know she was in a great deal of pain so she must be much happier now. Pain free and forever running around in an endless dog park somewhere, but it still just makes me wonder.

I miss Sugar, and I'll always remember that night. The night I sat with her until very late so I could see her one last time as long as I possibly could. I have a new, great, loving doggy now. We got her a year later. But it terrifies me to think that one day she will no longer be with me anymore. I know we all must pass sometime, I just don't like to acknowledge that fact sometimes.