What Do You Want…to Do While You Still Can?
Anything you really want to make sure you do, do it while you still can. Sometimes you can procrastinate just one night and never be able to do what you always knew you should.
A very dear older friend of mine finally had to let his beloved dog “cross the rainbow bridge” some years back, and I knew it was breaking his heart. I’m the same way about my dogs.
A few months later, I noticed he had not yet adopted another dog. We always shared the belief that “all dogs are dog,” part of the great universal doggie consciousness, and that every dog you loved came back to you in all the dogs you loved thereafter. I’ve experienced it many times, finding wonderfully familiar characteristics, idiosyncrasies, and personality traits in every dog we’ve ever adopted.
So why hadn’t he yet adopted a new puppy? I wasn’t prepared for his answer, but now I find myself obsessing over it.
“I don’t have 15 years left to devote to a dog,” he explained. For me, he was forever young, and it never occurred to me that he might not have 15 more years left. And he didn’t want to end up leaving a dog abandoned and alone when he passed. He thought it cruel. I realized I did as well. Suddenly, I understood what I previously thought was inexplicable, why he had not adopted another pup.
15 Years
Recently I realized that I’m now reaching the point in my life where I will soon come to doubt that I have 15 years left to offer to a new puppy. We live with three wonderful dogs, but they too are getting on in years and I wonder how it will be to live without dogs in my life again, as I was forced to do when I was young due to the “rules” of the housing project where we lived.
It also got me to thinking about when I was 15 years old and living in that housing project.
One night when I was 15 my dad asked me a question and I gave him an answer. He questioned the answer, and we began to discuss the issue. Then discussion gave way to argument. Then argument gave way to me being way too 15, way too full of myself, and saying some things nobody should ever say to anybody, much less their own dad.
The next morning, my dad was dead.
Your Mind Can Whack You Better Than Anything Else
A neighbor came to my school and brought me home, explaining what had happened. Coronary thrombosis mercifully in his sleep. He was just 54 years old, and he was gone. I was just numb. I don’t remember seeing anything as we drove back to where I lived. In fact, I don’t remember almost anything for that first hour or so.
Once home I fell onto our couch finally realizing what the word “stupefied” really meant.
The medical examiner’s team was taking my father’s body out of our house and one of them asked me to hold the door for them. As I went completely blank again, my cousin scolded him and ran to get the door in my place. I’ve never stopped being thankful and appreciative for her quick, incredibly considerate act. I still have no idea how she even got there.
But it was at that moment of their total insensitivity and her great mercy that I realized what was hitting me hardest. He was gone. My father was gone. And I would never have the chance to apologize to him for all the incredibly stupid things I had said to him the night before. It had kept me awake all night, and I had promised myself I would apologize profusely come the next day.
I’ve been apologizing to him ever since.
Over time, unable to overcome the overwhelming feeling of loss and the terrible final injustice I had inflicted on the one person I loved most on planet Earth, I came to commit to myself that I would never let things wait again. If I realized I had done wrong, I would apologize and try to compensate immediately. If I saw someone else do wrong, I would point it out so they could correct it, too. I never wanted to just let things lay ever again.
That has served or dis-served me to varying degrees throughout my life, as you can imagine.
My mind then proceeded to completely whack me completely out of shape. I became oddly sullen, uncommunicative. I began drinking horrible cheap alcoholic concoctions. I simply lost my bearings. I could no longer find my center, my balance. For a solid year I drifted completely unmoored. Then one night I began yelling at my father again out our kitchen window. I yelled at him for leaving me for a solid hour.
Then we never spoke of it again
Before It’s Too Late
Regular readers of “What Do You Want” will be familiar with my recent journeys through embracing impermanence and finding peace in that which I cannot comprehend. I’ve come to terms with the fact that I’m ultimately heading right back to where I was before I was born, to the land of nothing and nowhere. I don’t remember being unhappy about being non-existent before I was born, so I figure I won’t be unhappy about it after I die. I’m actually getting really good with that.
But…
But there are some things I still feel a deep inner need to accomplish before I’m done. “What Do You Want” is actually one of them. I have no answers for anyone but myself, but I feel driven to share the process I’ve lived through coming to terms with so much and finding so many answers. How to seek your answers is actually much more important than actually finding them. Some of them will never be found. Why I lost my dad so early. What there was before there was. What the true nature of what we think of as God really is. I’m good with accepting that I was never meant to really comprehend those answers.
But I do want to write so many of the things I’ve always been consumed by. All the questions. All the wondrous mysteries.
I’ve lived to see my children launch wonderfully successful lives. As does everyone, they have their challenges. But they step up to those challenges and confront them with strength and resolve. I’m not sure how I could ever be prouder of them.
Now I want to see their sons do the same. I want to offer them the benefit of my experience, give them food for thought, show them the many beautiful things I’ve found in life. Share their journey.
And I want to always have dogs in my life, without ever leaving any of them behind. Dogs have been my greatest friends, my confidants, my soulmates, my comfort when I was inconsolable, the wisdom I needed when I couldn’t find any in myself. They have taught me so much about the value of constancy, consistency, commitment, and true unconditional love. I cannot imagine my life without my dogs.
And now I’m wondering if maybe I don’t have enough time for just one more dog. One more puppy to raise and teach and love and provide the best possible life for.
My message? Anything you really want to make sure you do, do it while you still can. Sometimes you can procrastinate just one night and never be able to do what you always knew you should.
15 years. Do I still have 15 more years? 15 years to give to my last, my final beloved dog?
Maybe.
Howard, a 15 year old is a 15 year old and this is what happens between parents and teens. My mother and I did not get along and yet later in life it was me that was chosen to care for her and make all of the hard decisions. This is life and it’s short. There is little time for regret. I’m sorry you lost your father so young. The regretful thing is missing the part where you get to interact on a truly level playing field and then you become their parent of a sort. This too is a painful circle though. If you live long enough you’ll get to experience it from the other side. I dont have children so I have a great unknown ahead of me. You might be lucky enough to have your children care for you. Be patient with them.
Get the older dog. They’ve been through a lot and suffered loss just like all of us. My next dog will be older. My last two cats have been older. It’s a different relationship. One with painful back stories that we can all relate to.