Here's a post about changes. About changes, the passing of a friend in particular, and the way changes and endings come at you as long as your heart is beating.
Pebbles Bundy crossed over the Rainbow Bridge this afternoon. She was a few weeks short of her 12th birthday and had been suffering from a digestive condition for several months.
She was as sweet a cat as you could ever hope to meet. Gentle, sweet with a wonderful, mellow feline disposition. Food in her dish twice a day and some petting and stroking in the evening was all she ever asked of life.
When we went on our two day camping adventures she would watch us pack and go with an unruffled, mellow manner and greet us at the door when we came back home.
I helped Joan get her ready for her final trip to the vet as I was getting ready for work. Joan is a wonderful Cat Mom and it was her sad duty to take her to the good docs and staff at St Charles and be with her as she made that final journey.
I was relieved in a way that I had to get myself in to work while Joan made final arrangements. Being a part of that scenario would have added another layer of deep sadness to what has already been a challenging time for me.
I have been grieving the loss of another cherished relationship: Joan and I had come to a parting about three weeks before Pebble's time with us came to its own end. I'm moving back to Orlando next week.
As I reflected on the last three or four weeks, and what happened today, it occurred to me that Pebble's passing was -- among other things -- the last event where Joan and I would focus together on a matter of great and enduring significance to both of us; The final time we would be fully engaged in something that had the power to move us deeply and to touch a place in our hearts. The final time we would share deeply-felt emotions that no one else shared or could fully understand.
Changes and endings. They're a huge part of life. They keep coming. It's not going to stop. In fact, when we get to a certain stage of life, the changes accelerate, they fly by so quickly that we sometimes are hard-pressed to take in fully their true significance.
Some of those changes involve a death. A death of a friend, a family member. The death of a dream, of a cherished relationship.
It's not going to stop.
Hold on tightly to your friends, your loved ones. The friends who walk on their hind legs and the fur-bearing ones who love you unconditionally, with great ardour and whose love has the power to touch us in the deepest places in our hearts.
Hold tightly to them when the fire of love burns brightest. Love them, return their love and release them to the love, care and wisdom of the Universe when a time of ending comes.
And trust that your love -- mingled with theirs -- and the memories of shared experiences, of your time together will sustain you.
Sustain you and offer a sweet note of consolation. Especially if you must walk life's path alone for a time.
Healing Love to all of you. And all whom you love.
A loving, grieving and hopeful man, I am,
"Bulldog Ben" Basile
© 2021 Ben Lawrence Basile
Photo credit Joanie Bundy
