I’ve always been a spiritual person, and I’ve always loved God, fiercely. However, after losing Kally I was deeply angry with him. I was so mad... that I was forced to put her to sleep. That sickness took her body more quickly than I had hoped. I was so angry that he had cursed my beautiful dog with sickness and pestilence... but I knew I couldn’t blame him. And I was mad that I couldn’t even blame him. I remember standing in the beautiful woods by my house screaming “fuck you” to Adam and Eve. Stamping my feet because they only had one job. I blamed age... I blamed the mere coincidence that Boober and Kally were the same age, so losing them within a month apart would destroy me. And it did. But on the day Boober passed, I prayed for comfort and peace. I was covered in Chicken Pox before his euthanasia appointment. So I couldn’t just waltz in covered in spots like a leper. So I prayed at home over and over while my sister and mother took him. But I stopped my prayers and begged God for a sign that he heard me. I was so tired of empty answers and blank spaces. I was so tired of grief, and the grief from Kally was still unbearable. I was fervently yelling at him, and I remember stopping myself and muttering “but God has closed the heavens... so the signs... are no more”
They brought him back, wrapped in blue. Like a little bean, he was wrapped tightly, safe and sound. My sister said that he closed his eyes when he passed. The vet said that dogs rarely closed their eyes when they pass, so Boober must’ve been very, very tired and grateful. I know he was because he could hardly get up anymore. His basset hound genetic arthritis had eaten him up, but you bet he still waited up all hours for my sister and I to come home. 16 years we had with Napoleon (Boober) and Kally, and 16 years we were grateful.
We buried him, right beside Kally. The second the last bit of dirt was shoveled, a wind came down from the heavens. I live in southern Mississippi, so wind is nonexistent on a hot summer day. This wind came from nowhere. Like a breath from the heavens, it ripped through the trees. It was stronger than any wind I had ever felt, and it came directly down as if it was called to do so. The trees swirled above our heads and tossed back and forth. I can still see the trees and the way they moved. It was ethereal, holy... and strange. The wind was warm and comforting, and it was powerful. It was only in one spot... right where Boober and Kally were buried. Right where my entire family stood, burying him. That wind was so powerful that it pushed me... and with it, it carried away my burdens, my grief, and my sadness. It gave me comfort that rushed over me like a wave, and it was unlike anything I had ever felt before. I crave the way it made me feel. I can hardly describe or put into words how Godly it felt. God had heard me, and he had heard my angry screams for a sign. A sign that I wasn’t just praying to nothingness. I had questioned my faith, and he had answered with a force that I had never... I mean never expected. If I could put into more words, the way that wind felt. I would. But the only words that seem to fit is a breath from God pushed down from the heavens... a sign. That he heard my grief, my pain, and my anger... he had answered. He knew my pain, and he sent me a sign.
I never knew... I never knew that God still had signs left for us. For humans. For his creation. I struggled and wrestled with the idea that it was coincidence, but I had never felt a wind that ripped through the trees like that... that wrapped you in comfort like that. Two days later, and I still can’t fathom it. But, my anger is gone. My vengeful wrath is diminished, my depression and sadness... washed away. My grief is no where compared to where it was. It was like I blew past the other stages of grief... and I’ve made it to acceptance all in one gust of wind. I still feel an ache of sadness when I really really concentrate on Napoleon, but it’s a sadness of longing and missing something. Not like it was when Kally had passed. Even now, when I think of Kally... the pain is gone. My grief seems almost no more. And thank God for that. Thank God... thank you.