Seasons of Gray
She dribbles when she walks. Sometimes you can’t see the dribbles until she walks by; the spots tell stories like Hanzel and Gretal, a trail of where she’s been. I watch her. Carefully, closely, observing her gait. I wonder what others think. Do they see the pee?
She walks like it hurts. Hips shuffle. Moving. Unequally yoked pelvis rocks side to side carrying an old body. Worn cartilage. Bone on bone. Barely able to get into the car. Scary thought.
She dribbles when she walks. Not every day. Just some days. Sometimes every day. Sometimes she drools. I see it on her face. It drips down onto the floor. Next to the invisible pee. Strength and youth the outflow of a life that once inspired conversation. Her hair, gray. A giveaway. Extra hair protruding from small bumps. Small bumps of facial skin. Multiple tiny projectile hairs jutting out. A lost set of tweezers.
She walks by. A faint smell of urine follows. To care for her is endless. Life is seasonal. Temporary. Herein lies a truth of aging. The ebb and tide of life. Of living unselfishly, of caring, helping, hoping. Of building, restoring and being restored; these years precede the giving of our own life. We age. We fade. Our lives rest in caring, loving hands.
For all its mystery, its darkness - for the delusional misunderstandings of age, aged, and aging, a life well-loved enters ever after shrouded in acts of mercy, acts of kindness. Of support, justice and of grace.
She dribbles when she walks.
And sometimes I can’t see the dribbles until after she walks by.
The above essay, Seasons of Gray, was written earlier this year as a tribute to my selflessly devoted black lab mix, I affectionately named Carlie. Carlie was my fourth child, my fur baby, my constant companion since I adopted her as a young pup, a rescue pet, in 2005. After she came into my life, I had forgotten how much care it took to train, and house break a puppy, to teach it rules. It was very much like having another child!
Gradually through time and consistency, Carlie grew to become a great deterrent around strangers as well as a wonderful running mate. She often ran with me during my training runs, up to five miles at a stretch. Running together became our ritual, something we both looked forward to every morning. However, over the years as we both aged, Carlie began having hip and joint pain and could no longer run long distances. This saddened me somewhat. Though she could still walk around the trails with me, it was not the same. At least not for me. I knew her body was breaking down.
One day while caring for her dry cracked paw pads I considered her age. Carlie was thirteen-years-old in human years. Rumors tell me she’s old, but I lived in self-denial, with a can of Lysol at my side, and score of clean shop towels nearby.
Caring for an aging dog, in my simple opinion, is much like caring for an aged parent. The cloudy film in Carlie’s eyes when she looks at me, willing a treat from my hand, reminds me of the way an aged parent looks at their child-willing conversation. While my own children have living parents and grand parents, I do not have that honor; they passed while I was young.
Still, as difficult as it was to watch her body break down, to clean up dribbles of urine which leaked unknowingly from her, to carry her to the vet when her legs gave out, and soothe her during thunderous rainstorms, I considered it an honor to care for my aging dog, who once trained alongside me-chasing squirrels every chance she got.
~*~
