A God Among Dogs

     Yesterday I had to take my dog to be put to sleep. It was one of the hardest things I have ever done. There was a whole deeper meaning to the situation that made it all the more difficult. Thor was the sixteen-year-old dog of my soon-to-be ex-husband, Mark. The sorry story is that he left me, and left her with me. For the past eighteen months, I've been waiting for him to take charge of this crap situation that he created. I've been waiting for him to make things right with Thor… and I guess with me, too. I've had no desire to get back together with him since he left. I think I was hoping that he really was the man I always believed him to be and that he would actually follow through with his commitment to his dog… I was hoping that he wasn’t really the dirt-bag who would abandon his dog of fourteen years. 

     I kept her around longer than I should have, thinking he would suddenly grow up and come and get her from me. I thought I was doing the right thing by giving him the opportunity to do right by her and by me. I was waiting for something, hopeful of something unrealistic and uncharacteristic of a man I am not proud to have called my husband. I kept that poor dog alive because I really thought he was going to come for her. I believed in him… I tend to do that—believe in people even when they give me every reason not to. 

     On my way to the animal shelter, I felt the same way I did driving to my friend Ardan’s funeral nine months ago. I wasn’t sure I was going to make it. I was very aware of my hands. They were very light and felt as if they were going to fall apart. It took a strong conscious effort to make them work to turn my steering wheel and hold the shifter. I cried hard at the shelter, on the way home and as I stopped to get gas. I sat for a few moments in my car, and let myself lose all faith and all hope I had in humanity. It was an amazing experience. I never allow myself to indulge in hopelessness. In that moment, I actually let myself feel pure hatred for what I think was the first time ever in my life. I don’t recall ever hating anyone the way I was letting myself hate Mark… I honestly didn’t, and still don’t, care what happens to him. I don’t wish him any harm; I just don’t care. Horrible things could happen to him and I would feel no pity, no sadness, nothing. I let him go. 

     My body was filled with rage, anger and shame, and I experienced it all, acknowledged it, and now I’m free. Right there I realized that none of this had anything to do with Thor. I was not sad for her nor did I feel bad about having her put to sleep—it was time for her to go. I was angry and ashamed that I had loved and put my hopes, energy and life into someone who wasn’t capable of taking care of a dog, much less a marriage and family. My keeping her around allowed me to keep denying that he was and is a miserable piece of shit. I feel free in so many ways.

     After I came home that day, I was in my room leaning on my bed taking off my shoes. Suddenly, I felt a physical force, a real and definite presence, in the whole of my abdomen, but mostly in my chest. I felt it leave me. It wasn’t something that passed through me, it was something that was part of me that left me and at that moment there in my room, I knew I could do anything. I was afraid of nothing or no one. Typing that, just now, made me cry—it was so powerful. I felt whole and still do. 

     I went downstairs and threw the rest of Thor’s food in the yard for the birds. I cut a piece out of her blanket and put it in front of the Santisima Muerte altar in my office. I asked Santisima to watch over her and I prayed that Thor’s next life will be more fortunate than this one as a dog (there’s the Buddhist in me). I didn’t stand long in front of my altar and turned away as I was still praying—I just wanted to get the hell out of the clothes I had on and be done with the day. The sun was down now, and I went to dinner with some friends who were in from out of town to work a tattoo convention. At dinner we had a good time laughing and talking. We were all exhausted from our various days, but we went to a tattoo convention party out of obligation and it was there that I saw several people who were mutual friends of Mark’s and mine. I noticed again how no one really had anything good to say about him. I figured they had been humoring me since our break-up and maybe they had. It’s weird, but I never clued in before how everyone makes jokes about his typical lack of responsibility. Dirt bag.