I stand at the back door and look out into the landscape of white - silent, except for the twittering of many small birds - at this time of year, likely redpolls, goldfinches and juncos, in flocks. Chickadees are here year round, of course, and flit about all day, along with the woodpeckers and jays - larger flocks come and go. The silence and the snow is wonderful; in this crazed,disintegrating world, I know I am fortunate to be here. I stand and watch while my 10 month old puppy sniffs the snow,  tries to catch a defiant red squirrel, stares around in wonderment at the world. He is tall, brown, elegant, thoughtful - beautiful - and he adores me. I love him back with a depth and  desperation that only someone as hurt as I am could feel, for the (briefly) small being who entered my life at the most painful of times and just gives love endlessly and without question. He is my strength and my comfort, the source of any smiles or laughter in my day (well, aside from Korky) he gives me meaning and purpose, is my anchor to this earth, all in return for some home cooked food and a soft bed of snuggles every night.

I am surviving...some days better than others. My body is pretty much broken and my spirit, hanging by a thread. But, I continue..and the tall, brown, thoughtful, 90 pound puppy has helped. Light from the late afternoon sun  sets the snow sparkling and ice on the trees creates a shimmering backdrop of glass. It is beautiful, quiet, and  still, magical and bittersweet, and always, always....empty.

Everywhere in this stillness, there you are. I see the Hills, through the forest out back, off in the distance, and there you are - there WE are, roaming together, me giddy with joy, you with your serious face and purposeful sniffing.

I see the sunlight fall across the yard a certain way and it's like your energy sweeps through me, so many times I stood enraptured, somewhere in the wild, and you stopped whatever you were doing to stand motionless with me, as if feeling what I was to the core of your being.

Everywhere inside, your sweet, serious, so changeable face peers out at me, from framed pics to casual photos on the fridge to the memorial I'm building in the room I keep my most precious things in...I am never without you, but always without you.

"Gabriel says that he was sent from heaven in specific answer to Daniel’s prayer."

One Heart

 This morning has been terrible. Simply, indescribably awful. I woke up reliving his last hours, and felt to the core of my being that I had betrayed the strongest love and greatest need I've ever experienced. My "daemon" (for those of you who get the reference) my baby. Like our long beautiful sacred story was eradicated in a few hours, by me, who was never worthy of this Gift in the first place.

The above was written at 6:30  and now it is almost 9, I have moved on to a different manifestation of this misery. For some it will be a little mystical, for others it will resonate, but this journey is mine and this is what I feel, experience, suffer every moment as I try to walk through the loss, the guilt, the self reproach.

I feel, at times I am experiencing his memories. Things like, our drives back and forth to the store all the months Alex was gone - I'd sing goofy songs to him, and when we were on the way home I'd exclaim "LOOK where we live, Rabbit!"  and he'd start looking wildly about as if that statement of mine meant there were deer in a  field, a dog strolling by, or something else of equal interest. Not Mom just exclaiming how elated she was to live in the place did. Every time this played out...and I remember it as the driver, the human, looking over the fields on Shouldice Rd, beholding the funny adorable predictable Danny-behaviour...that's how I remember it.

Until he died, that is - now I have these flashes as though I am recalling it all through him. Strange, mystical, bizarre as that will sound, and to some, sure evidence of my PTSD and probably slide into psychosis. I feel like I'm remembering bits of his life...through his eyes.