I am awake, I am alive, and once again today I establish my “new normals” …

I have spoken of this before. It is what happens on that first day of work in a new place, that first day in a new town, or the first day after someone is gone. New routines must be established but when grieving is the reason, sometimes it is hard to let go.

And that is when we give thanks for the people who help. Honestly, I struggled a lot last night. Our bedtime routines were some of my favourite times with my furmate and not having those play out left me raw and in pain until I read my daughter’s words.

My daughter has lost four pets in quick sucession, Oreo being the fourth. I bought Oreo for her when she was only 17. Eventually Oreo came to live with me when grandkids got to be too much for her elderly bones but Kazz has always remained her Mommy which is why these words are so incredibly powerful.

So powerful, that I just had to share them with you. I pray if you grieve, that they will help you as much as they helped me.

I love you! HUGSSSSSSS

 
Sandi
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The Place Between
by Cassandra Craig …

You aren’t gone from me and you never will be. I hear them say you are gone, I saw you leave, but you came back as soon as I was alone. You are still meowing at my mom for lap naps. You are still punching the back door to go outside. You are still purring like a rusty gate while grooming Simba. You are still missing your litter box and looking mighty proud of yourself. You are all here swirling around me like you never left at all.

I hope the pain that cuts into me like knives never goes away, because every painful stab I remember you and everything you ever were. You are scattered like snow, like confetti, and sprinkled all over my life. You pop like soap bubbles leaving cool wet prints on my skin. You are everywhere now, the spaces between become one, there is no separation. The pieces that made you, you break down into, to become a part of everything again. You are in the space between dreams and awake. In that place I will always love you. In that place we will always be together.

There is no want, there is no need, there is no scared, or sad, or missing me. There is no pain, there is no fear, there is no inevitability, there is no finality. You are forever now, carved into the rocks, growing on the trees. You are in the sunlight and the very air I am breathing. I catch on those breaths as I feel you. The tears pouring down my cheeks are each one a little taste of you and the feelings you created.

There is no now or then or one day, there is only forever.

I will say goodbye to you a thousand times, and hello again a thousand more.

I will break and mend and break and mend and each time it will be for you and because of you. I will be changed again and again because of what you were and what you are now.

I pity the people who didn’t get to know you and treasure you and understand the light you brought into this place and took with you when you left. Yet I can feel that light even now so I know here with me you stay. The light is inside now instead of shining on me, and it burns inside until it wells upwards and becomes cooling droplets raining down to fall on my cheeks, my lips, and my heart.

I weep now because you loved me, because I loved you, because the separation between us I can still feel even though you now don’t have to. For you have joined as a part of everything, and I linger here as a piece separated from the whole. When I come to find you that eventual day, you will welcome me in silence as I become the snow, the confetti, as I become one instead of only.

So I carry on, feeling it all, hoisting my pain like a flag to honour your march, your journey. You are undying, a legacy, because your life meant everything to me, and now you are always here, always brushing your fur against my atoms and deafening my senses with the impact of your moments.

I love you. I miss you. I let go only to always hold on.