It’s been almost three months since Gidget passed away. There are days I really miss her companionship. And then there are days I’m enjoying more time for myself. Though as I wrote about when she first passed the feelings of loneliness were difficult and sometimes overwhelming.
I was chatting today with a friend who will be traveling through Wisconsin in mid-September with her camping rig and her sweet, blind cat named Idgie. Mary lives full-time in her rig and escapes the cold winters of Pennsylvania to head south (If you like, you can follow her adventures on her blog at, Wildheart Wanders ).
We haven’t seen each other for quite a few years. She will be staying one night in her rig parked in front of our house before heading off to her class reunion. I’ve never met Idgie and have only seen photos of her that Mary shares on Facebook. So I’m quite tickled I’ll get to meet her in person! Or err, I guess that might be catson? 😉
Mary and I have known each other since my days when I published my first children’s book about my first disabled dog, Frankie – who became somewhat famously known as the Walk ‘N Roll Dog. Can you believe that has been eleven years?! Mary wrote a book about disabled pets and that is how we connected as I began to market my children’s book.
As we chatted back and forth she realized this would be the first time she’d be visiting John and me without us having a dog. She wondered if perhaps we aren’t planning on getting another dog as she said from what she gathered we weren’t going to.
We do want another dog someday. But when that will be I don’t know right now. There are days I feel like I may want another dog, but more often than not, I just don’t feel ready yet. When I go for a walk, it never fails that I meet up with dogs on a walk with their people. Sometimes I’ll stop and ask if I can pet their dog and that, for now, satisfies me.
John and I talk about another dog now and then and it’s often we fondly talk about memories of not only Gidget but our other dogs too.
Sometimes it feels odd that I don’t have this urge to get another dog right away as I did in the past. But I also felt this coming, that after Gidget, I’d be taking a break. As I said to my friend Mary, and something I’ve noticed, is that I don’t miss my focus being so split.
I know it wasn’t just caring for Gidget that my energy began to feel so depleted, but it was also working through a painful childhood wound and memory that took all I had the last few years. I’ve written about this and will be sharing in my upcoming memoir, I’m Fine Just the Way I Am.
In many ways, I feel like this time has been about calling my energy back home to me. Sharing with Mary about taking a break she said, “I totally get that. You’ve had a lot on you in the past decade+ since we met.”
I shared with Mary it was a path I chose. I have no regrets of having cared for three disabled dachshunds in thirteen years. Though yes, it was trying at times, I would have never experienced and learned what I did. I’m forever changed, in a good way I think, because of them.
It was the journey I was meant to walk. And while I can feel restless at times wondering what is next, and what dog will be part of our family someday, I’m reminded again to trust the mystery of the unknown.
The photo above is of pencil drawings of each of my dachshunds done by a dear lady I met when I did a presentation where she worked. They hang in my writing cottage and I look at them often. Each time I do, my heart swells with so much love and gratitude for the gift of each of them.
XO,
Barbara
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