Sean,
I am so sorry about Odie. He was a good cat and I know he was a good friend to you. As soon as I received the email from your mom it was like a switch was thrown in I my brain and some long forgotten memories resurfaced. Growing up the animal I was most attached to was a little mixed-breed dog named Friskie. She was my everyday companion. The house I grew up in had a driveway that came down one side of the house and made a semicircle to the garage on the other side. The inside of the semicircle was fenced for a dog run. There was a little back porch off the kitchen over the garage door. That little porch was my day-dreaming place. I would go out and sit on the floor of the porch, sometimes for hours at a time, and imagine wonderful things, including how I would be the hero of any circumstance when I was grown. Friskie would lay on the porch with her head in my lap for as long as is sat there (except when a cat or another dog would trespass in our yard). With the help of Mom and Dad, I took good care of her. Every year we took her to the vet and got her shots. We made sure she had good food and plenty of exercise. During the winter, Dad would rig a 150-watt light bulb in her doghouse for some heat. And, if it got really cold, we would fix a bed in the basement and bring her in.
In those days, the annual shots for dogs did not include a shot to prevent distemper. One day when I came home from school Mom said that Friskie must have a hurt paw because she was not walking right. We checked to see if she had a cut or thorn stuck in the paw but could not find anything. Within a few days, she was having trouble with both her hind legs and we knew something was wrong. We took her to the vet and he said that he thought she had distemper. He gave her a shot but said that distemper was almost impossible to treat once the animal was infected. We took her home and we hoped – and I prayed for my dog. For a few days she did not get better but her condition did not worsen, encouraging our hope. We kept her in the basement and placed her food and water close to her bed so she didn’t have to walk far. Every day, as soon as I got home from school, I headed directly to the basement to check on Friskie. One day, about a week after the trip to the vet, I saw her perk up as I came down the steps. By the time I reached the bottom, she was out of her bed coming across the floor to me – only her back legs didn’t work at all. She was dragging herself across the floor with her front paws to be close to me. I knew right then that the battle was lost – she was not going to recover. For a couple days this scene was repeated only it was obvious that she was in pain as she drug herself across the floor. That night Mom and Dad set me down and explained that Friskie was not going to get better and that she was suffering. Since she was my dog, I needed to be the one to make the decision. I knew what that decision needed to be though my heart was breaking. The next afternoon I sat with my best friend in my lap for a couple of hours until Dad got home and then I said goodbye to Friskie.
That was over 50 years ago and I am weeping as I write this. God has given us such a great gift in the animals we love and who become so dear to us. I’m not the greatest theologian but I believe that there will be animals in the New Heavens and the New Earth – God wants us to see the perfection of His creation as it existed in the Garden. I wanted you to know that, if I could, I would carry all your sadness for you – but I can’t. I certainly know how you feel and I am very sad for you.
Love,
GP
