Cycles of Life

On the way to the vet's this morning, we rode slowly, I in the back holding our 16-year-old Husky so she wouldn't jostle and hurt her dear self, my husband driving while mopping up his tears. We passed families going to market, the little ones jumping like puppies, an old woman bent double with her shawl draped against the sun. At one point a Dachshund puppy of about 5 months jumped up into his master's arms, seemingly alongside a bag of groceries, both from the back seat of an old Volvo.

We managed to carry her into the operating room, and the vet, near tears himself, declared her beyond hope, as her back legs had almost atrophied already. We held her and talked gently to her as the vet gave her one shot for relaxing, the next to stop her heart. I had thought this would be the hard part--watching her go. It wasn't. It just happened. She relaxed and went to sleep, and her shoulders, her face, and eyes all relaxed completely. We were draped like damp towels over her, needing to say so many things to the longest-standing pet we'd ever owned, but reassured that she knew our hearts already.

Her name was Stella; she was the kind of Husky with long hair, with one blue eye, one brown. . . a noble dog, the alpha of the group which had shifted in several ways over the years, a Collie Shepherd having run away; a mixed Terrier having died suddenly. She weathered two new Dachshund puppies and three moves, one from Chicago to Mexico. She had the most beautiful face, black with a white muzzle shaped like a star.

I trimmed a bit of her black-and-white hair before we left the house, while she slept this morning, and slipped it into a painted wooden box marked "Gran," one of the earliest gifts from our daughter after her son was born. I remembered to remove her collar and tags. I see her star face, trusting and good, resting where it will remain always, in my mind's eye.