Losing a Dog; A Dog's Death; BJ the Beagle Dies

"Today, outside under a huge oak tree in the beautiful October sun, BJ died quietly in my arms. I always sang to him Rosemary Clooney's "You'll Never Know Just How Much I Love You" and today, the last lines were especially poignant."

Here are the lines to which she was referring:

"If there is some other way to prove that I love you,/ I swear I don't know how./ You'll never know if you don't know now."

I had the privilege of meeting BJ, and his owner, about a year ago. Every week she (his owner) and I would meet for dinner and Italian conversation, since we both were trying to perfect our knowledge of that beautiful language. Whenever I arrived at her home for dinner, she would greet me at the door with BJ at her side. Well, sometimes BJ would just look up at me from his comfortable position on the couch... But when he greeted me, he would look intently at me, checking to see if I was "worthy" of entering into the sacred precincts of the house which he guarded so diligently. Satisfied that I fit the "bill," he let me in and retired to his favorite places. Often if she and I were having too much "fun" in conversation, BJ would make his presence known, as if to warn us gently not to forget who really was the important "person" in the house.

Over the 13 years of BJ's life, he became a neighborhood favorite, and he thus was the means for my friend to make dozens of friendships with children of all ages as they took their daily walks around the block. His droopy ears, longingly endearing brown eyes and slight padding manner made him a wonderful subject for human affection as well as, no doubt, some imitation.

Stopping By..

I decided yesterday, after my writing, that I would take a walk to the store and buy a card for my friend, expressing my condolences at the loss of BJ. So, I filled it out, dropped by her house and debated whether to knock on the door or just drop it through the mail slot. I decided to knock, and she was there. In the next 45 minutes we had the most refreshing and wide-ranging conversation. Some people flinch in the face of death, but for me it is the occasion to explore our own feelings of loss, life, nature's ways and the resiliency of the human spirit. So we talked, first about my trip to WI and MN (she is a WI native), then about our Italian conversations (which have fallen by the wayside in the past few months), and then finally about BJ.

I asked her to describe BJ's last days, and she did so, with clarity, feeling, insight and gratitude. The last days, during which she rushed from one vet to another, from testing and uncertainty, from getting the hopes up to having hopes dashed, she characterized as "difficult beyond words." A loved one was in great distress, and there were really no certain answers about what was happening. BJ shook uncontrollably at times; his creatinine was dangerously high; he had to take subcutaneous fluids; he threw up all he ate; he seemed alternatively animated and listless.

Despite the rush and uncertainty occasioned by these pressures, my friend began to feel somehow, mysteriously and strangely, that things were not "out of control." Questions that she would not have considered earlier, such as "second opinions," or "pulling the plug," or "informing friends," just seemed to present themselves in a manner that she could calmly decide. Yes, she would take him from the clinic in Salem to the Oregon State University clinic; yes, she was able to separate her love for BJ's continuing life with her and her perception of what he needed from her; yes, she had a sense that one or two friends were more crucial at this particular time than others. And, she noted to me, for some reason her normally-hectic teaching and lecturing schedule (she not only teaches but she trains new teachers) was busy the last three weeks but completely "open" this week. It was almost as if nature was taking charge in the frantic and quick movements of the last three days, saying that this transition in life would be a good one, even if the thought of such a loss seems never to be a good one.

Conclusion

My friend noted that in the last few days of BJ's life that she stopped eating, too. Why was that?, she wondered. My mind immediately recalled the Biblical story of David's failure to eat while his baby son was ill. It is as if we share a sort of "mini-death" with our beloved and would love nothing better than to give some of our vibrancy to the one from whom life is ebbing.

And so BJ died in her arms on the shady grounds of the OSU clinic on October 31, 2007. The Willamette Valley has been blessed with an incredibly beautiful run of weather in the last 10 days--as if nature was trying to make up for clobbering us in early October. The final rustling of the leaves clinging to the spreading oaks, the big-leafed maples gently lapping in the breeze, the majestic Douglas-firs ever standing sentry in the shimmering October sun--all of this created the scene for the best kind of "good death."

And so my friend puts her life back together, convinced that "those eyes and that wagging tail are charming everyone wherever he is chasing now..." BJ's life was a very good one. As was his death. We, as humans, have much to learn from both.

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