2013 Video Montage

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Our baby girl is turning "1"!

Durango! 2013

Someone emailed this to us recently, and although we were so fortunate to meet and to get acquainted with (and to love) Ava's birthmother, it is still a beautiful poem that touched us both...

Legacy of an Adopted Child

Author Unknown

Once there were two women

Who never knew each other.

One you do not remember, 

The other you call mother.

Two different lives

Shaped to make yours one. 

One became your guiding star,

The other became your sun.

The first gave you life

And the second taught you to live it.

One gave you a nationality, 

The other gave you a name.

One gave you a seed of talent, 

The other gave you an aim. 

One gave you emotions, 

the other calmed your fears.

One saw your first sweet smile,

the other dried your tears.

One gave you up -

It was all that she could do.

The other prayed for a child

And God led her straight to you.

And now you ask me

Through your tears,

The age-old question

Through the years:

Heredity or environment

Which are you the product of?

Neither, my darling - neither,

Just two different kids of love. 

Missing our boy...

Small boy

I think of you, my handsome boy.

Yes, I missed you in the spring,

but I imagine you… soft and small

and fresh, the way you stayed.

In some ways.

You worked the hearts of all

who passed you by

that summer, you came to me.

Small boy, big ears, huge heart,

and all.

You bound me fully

in your charms.

So cavalier, my noble love.

A goodly soul, a godly one, a mighty man,

you became.

Leaves began to fall,

you stood so strong, so still,

you faced your foe.  You nearly foiled us all!

Your enemy so slight

in light, of YOU.

My beautiful boy,

with a fervor I loved you.

If such passion could be captured

I’d wake tomorrow morn’, and save the world!

I assume.

Autumn withered, 

trees burned orange,

filtered yellow flowers

through an open door that came too soon.

Small boy. Once again.

I kissed your brow

once, a million times.

Teardrops dripped, poured really

across your face. With big brown eyes,

you trusted me still.

Carried you, as if once more,

you were that summer pup

tendered to me for safekeeping.

Peacefully you slipped away from this world.

From my world.

And now it is winter I face.

A bird among hundreds

on that cold morning wire

Searching for that sign.  Are you still here?

My dear heart, you are.

Feel your breath as I hold her tight.

Rest behind me while I

fall in love.  Ears perked, tail swaying

when she smiles. Reviving the peace within,

my sheriff.

So I look to another spring,

and my heart stays filled.

It was you that made certain.

Small boy, big ears, huge heart,

And all. 

~ mhb

Merry Christmas to all! 

"Godspeed, good friend"

 

I'm not sure when exactly it felt as if we were on "borrowed time" with our sweet Ozzie, but maybe it was the first time that I saw a new nodule on his chest xray in April.  Maybe it was in June when he struggled for every breath ~ before we began to schedule him to have the malignant pleural fluid from his lungs drained at the veterinarian's office.  Maybe it was in the morning, sometimes, when I would wake up and look down at my sweet boy by my side in his bed, thinking that maybe it would be the last time. And perhaps it was in August on the first night after his chest tube was placed, and I held the warm fluid from his body in a cup in my hands before I dumped it in the toilet.  We would do this a hundred more times in order to help our darling boy make it just a little bit longer.  He had a two week trip to Colorado coming up! And he was going to meet his baby sister, Ava! And he had some more afternoons of lounging in the grass and feeling the sun on his sunken little body. 

For as much as I remember of the details in the past several months, I remember everything from the past 18 hours.  I remember how I went outside to him in the grass yesterday.  I threw his ball no more than 3 feet from him, and he got up to chase it, but fell.  His back legs were so weak that they couldn't carry him.  He hadn't eaten in over 4 days. And so I made "the call".   I cleaned him up as well as I could.  And I remember now, how he has a big black spot on the right side of his back.  And he has the soft part on the side of his ears without cartilage.  (Do all dogs have that?) And he has black lips. He has a pink spot on the right side of his black nose. I could feel every bone in his body. He has a brown "good boy spot" on the top of his soft head.

Oh, and he has white eyelashes.... this.... the only sign that he has grown old. Because he is actually ... too young to die. 

And the way that the sun was setting on the palm trees last night was so beautiful. His last night. I brushed his teeth still, like I do every day.  Guy drained his chest tube.  Oz stared into the flames of the outdoor fireplace in the evening with his big brown eyes, and then he curled up next to us on his bed while we ate dinner on our patio.  And we looked at him, and we looked at each other, and we sobbed with heavy, heavy hearts.

Why is it that we cannot remember touch? Why will I not be able to remember the sensation of my lips on his muzzle as I kissed him goodbye? In a few months or maybe a year, will I forget what his fur felt like as I rubbed his neck beneath his collar today? I am going to try so hard to remember.  But in the end, it seems like it is always pictures and videos and some lingering scents that remain with us. How many times have you really remembered the actual feeling of someone that you loved in your past beneath your hand or against your body? Do you remember the feeling of their breath against you? I know that the feeling of his skinny femur under my palm or that soft part of his ear will probably fade, even if I fight it tooth and nail. Isn't that true? I guess that I don't really know.  I've never faced death so up close and personal before.

This morning, I hoped beyond all hopes that Ozzie would be "El Milagro" once again.  I held out a bowl of food for him and he, once more, turned away.  And that is how it went... he refused to eat again, and I listened to him, in all of the glory of his 40 pound wasted figure and his soulful eyes.  Is this what it is? When everyone says, "It's time?" I will still never know for sure.  Because, perhaps, he would have wanted to lay his body down in the grass again today and feel the sun on his tiny body. And maybe he wanted to taste cool water on his tongue just one more time as he delicately sipped from his bowl. Maybe he wanted to wag his tail once again when a visitor arrived "just for him". Maybe he would have wanted to lay in bed with me in the still hours of the morning for one more day, just so that I could feel his strong heart beat and his warm breath against my hand. Maybe he wanted to be loved for just one more day. Maybe he wanted to give me just one more kiss. I'll never know for sure. 


Today, November 2nd, 2012, at 12:10 pm, Oswald West Borders, a.k.a. Ozzie, Manny-Mo, Good boy, left his ravaged body for good in exchange for his heaven: a huge green and grassy field, with a fence going across it (wouldn't want to forget that fence!) so that he could run back and forth, back and forth, back and forth... and bark and bark and bark at all of the passersby, who (yes!) are passing by just to see him! There may just be a few big orange squeaky balls in his running path as well. I will miss my Ozzie with all of my heart until I see him once again.  So, he'd better not forget about me, and he'd better be waiting for me to come and press his "good boy" button on the top of his soft head when we meet again on the other side.

Thank you, darling boy, for being a part of my life. My perfect boy, my perfect dog, my perfect manny. I loved you with all of my heart.