Beloved Mischa (original) (raw)

Dear Mischa,

You knew that I loved you. Even so I wish I could have been there when you died, so I could have told you one last time.

I told you afterwards. I told you when I hold your body, I told you so many times, over and over again. Clutching you, crying helplessly, unable to say anything but, "I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you..."

Once upon a time I was afraid that I might not grieve for you when you died. Now I know that that doubt meant just one thing: I couldn't imagine a world without you. And here I am, living it, each day, day by day.

A dozen times a day I reach for you in my mind, feeling for those places and routines and emotions where you used to be, and each time it's a shock that you're not there.

I told you I'd see you again. That was just shorthand, of course. I don't know if that's how the universe works. But I know with every sinew in my body that wherever you have gone, I follow: to oblivion, to limbo, to Elysium. I could want no part of anywhere after this that didn't have a place for you.

We had you cremated. We didn't want to bury you here, where we'll so soon be leaving; we couldn't bear the thought of leaving you alone among strangers. I would rather have dug a place for you, there to lay your body down in the good earth and cover you over forever, but instead we sent your silent still body to the flames. We'll take your ashes with us and when we're settled, when we have a place forever, we'll place you to rest there and plant a tree over you, our Mischa, our beloved and infinitely missed malamute dog.

God knows how much I miss you.

There you lay in that little room at the crematorium. The people there were kind: they covered the brutal surgical wound in your abdomen, they laid a rose beside you and placed a candle to either side of you. Your fur smelled both of you, that lovely clean aroma that I breathed so many times over the years and which never lost its charm; and it also smelled of death. You were in rigor mortis, your frame cold and hard in a way that conveyed your death even more concretely than your utter motionlessness did. Your eyes were dark and quiet, almost closed, still holding a gentle gleam. Your tongue-tip was peeking out in that goofy adorable way it so often did when you slept.

So much of you was still there. The lay of your fur, the cant of your ears, the patterning on your muzzle: all so utterly familiar, all as beautiful to me as they ever were. Surely I knew these things better than I know my own body, so many times did I marvel over them in the nine years we were together. Yet these things were nothing compared to what was lost: your warmth, your supple vitality, your silliness and quirks, your gentleness of heart and your stubborn shining individuality. Even when you were alive I could not know all there was to know of you; how could I fix you in my memory now, now matter how hard I tried? Only one thing in the universe could hold a candle to you, my Mischa, and that was you in the fullness and warmth of the life that you've left behind you.

I stroked your face, your cheek, your muzzle, and your eyes narrowed as they had when I stroked you while you drowsed. I kissed your snout as I had so many thousand times. I told you I loved you. I told you I'd never forget you. I told you thank you, thank you, thank you for the joy and the privilege of being your human. I told you you were a good dog. I told you you were my dog, I told you I loved you, and I cried and cried and cried and cried and cried.

Then I rose from that place, and turned and looked back at you lying there so still. It was too soon to leave you. It will always be too soon.

You were my dog, and I loved you more than I know how to say. Be at rest now. I love you and I always will.

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