revjim.net

I've been up for a little less than 2 hours now — somewhere between 4 and 5am is a typical wake up time for me. I have a 7am meeting that I'm taking from home. I have to leave no later than 9:30am to catch my flight to Hershey, PA. I get back around midnight on Friday night. I should be in the shower right about now so that, once my meeting ends, I can spend my remaining time packing my bags and visiting with Celeste and Jess before I go but my mind is racing. Maybe this will help.

The longest I've been away from Celeste has been about 2 1/2 days. This will be about the same with the exception that she is not likely to be awake when I get home Friday night. Some how, it feels longer though.

I found out yesterday that I've got to be back in Syracuse for the week of 4/21. I just now realized I forgot to even tell Jess that with everything going on yesterday so, if you're up early this morning, you may even find out before her. It also looks like I might be in Hampton, VA for the week of 5/5. That's not set in stone just yet, but it'll happen soon. These will not be easy times.

I'm reminded that I need to find a rock to put on top of the small mound of clay and grass where I laid Samson. Perhaps this weekend Jess will help me pick out something worthwhile.

I understand death. It's natural, and necessary, and normal. It's part of the cycle. It isn't easy, but I can accept it. But there are some aspects of this that I'm having a really hard time with.

First, the pain and torture that poor creature must have experienced in his final moments. I have a horrific, graphic, visual record of it imprinted on my brain. The details would only serve to horrify others as well. I'd like to get them off my chest. But not now. For now, they are mine. Throughout the day I somehow convinced myself that I had imagined it worse than it was. But burying him last night I realized that I did not. I'm sure time slowed for me in those moments, but it felt like it lasted so long, and I knew there was nothing I could do. Knowing this animal suffered hurts me. And it hurts me even more to know that he suffered at my hand, even if indirectly.

I'm also having a hard time knowing that there is some family — possibly some little Celeste or even adult Jessica — that misses him dearly and continues to wonder when he'll come home. Maybe they call for him at night. Maybe they fill a bowl of food on the porch every morning, just in case. I wonder if, in a few weeks, I'll see a sign in the community center. I wonder if I should go look or if it's just better that I didn't.

At least I know that I did right by Samson and his family. I know that if in a few weeks from now some little boy wants to know where his cat went I'll have something to say to him. I can tell him that there was an accident, tell him that his dear friend is no longer here, and give him a visible place to mourn. This is much better than having to tell this little boy that his cat's body was tossed aside with the rest of the trash and now sits rotting at the top of the Denton landfill.

I don't feel guilty about his death. There was nothing I could have done to prevent it. Sure, I now have the habit of checking every single tire of my car before driving off anywhere and, in that light, there was something I could have done. But I accept what happened as an accident and not due to negligence, or hurriedness, tunnel vision. And I'm grateful that this burden fell on me instead of the family of this dear friend. But still, I hurt.