the zak diaries
People have written a whole lot about their relationships with dogs, as they live and as they die.

Week 5 - homestretch
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For some periods each day, until recently, I've been able to forget, for awhile that Zak is dying. He's eating big, has a lot of energy for 15-20 minute walks, super attentive. His senses are all intact. He hears and sees and tracks my movements as he always has. He gets underfoot in the kitchen and scored a piece of pepperoni under the couch at a friend's house last week. I mean, could we function if we remembered that we, and everyone we love, are dying each day? I am so moved by his resiliency – his very life force. I do not think he knows yet that he is dying and I'm so glad for that.
I had a consult with a veterinarian intuitive on last week and she told me that Zak was going to enjoy his life to the end and then “go out like a rocket,” probably from one of the tumors rupturing. She also said he had about 3 weeks left. So now there’s no forgetting. Every other moment is both precious and a staggering reminder, a trigger for my grief. And I’ll be traveling apart from him an unusual amount this month, with two trips to the west coast. So….the timing is shit. I’m trying to see a bright side, how these coming separations pave the way for the ultimate, how Ellen will take the best possible care of him while I’m gone, but still. It sucks.
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It's worth saying now, and likely again, that Zak has caused harm to some people. He came into this life with a wave of aggression mixed in with adventurous, loving self, and I never really figured out how to break him of it. It is probably the thing I am most ashamed - or at least regretful about - because of the pain and anxiety this has caused for others and also for him as he’s had to navigate that energy. I have been praying for forgiveness and understanding from those he's hurt and hoping that the next ride for his spirit will be a bit gentler.
I’m back at Ocracoke for the big summer music festival this weekend. Last night as I rode my bike through the night from one venue to another I looked up to see the Big Dipper looming in front of me, close enough to touch. The stars and the cool air brought such a wave of gentleness and I felt suddenly that the night sky was readying to welcome him.
Facing the horrible realization - I might not be with him physically when he dies but I believe that he will make the decision to wait or not. I have told him a few times that my preference is to be around for the end with him. May it be so.
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Day 7 - specter
I'm walking around under a dark cloud much of the time these days. I can imagine other people in this situation. On the verge of a sure divorce or serious break up. Understanding your organization or business is about to close. Knowing that someone you love is going to die, sooner than expected, sooner of course than desired. The impending doom, not knowing exactly when but knowing something real bad is going to happen, is a weird place to be. You forget for a stretch, the way I remember waking up sometimes after someone close has died. In those first few moments of a new day you forget something terrible has happened. And then the light of day and you remember. That happens a lot now. There are a bunch of patches of these pink tulips near my parents' apartment. That is helpful.
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Day 6, owning up
Today I'm being challenged to lean into this reality and its effects on the rest of my life. My brain is functioning at about 70-80% which seems fine, for now. I'm heading to NYC in a few moments to help my folks pack up their apartment and 70% seems like enough capacity for packing up boxes. But after that I need to start focusing on the report I'm writing about the amazing LGBTQ movement in the South and 70% won't cut it. So I'm focusing on sleep and food and exercise and all the rest, with high hopes.
The interesting part is owning up to it all with other people. And that means gently cutting through my own uneasiness. (Won't some people, inevitably, think - it's just a dog? Yes, yes they will. And that, I've decided is okay and not really about me.) My colleagues on the immigrant rights project in NC have been amazingly generous. I've just told a rabbi I love in the Bay that I won't be able to lead a retreat for their congregation in June because I'm shortening my trip considerably. Ditto a couple other commitments and plans with dear friends. I mentioned the situation to a friend and former program officer and he relayed a beautiful and vulnerable story of his own experience with losing 2 cats. I posted about it on the site of a small sangha I am in and got the most loving counsel back from another member.
So today I'm owning it all: fog + vulnerability + my truth + enoughness.
Day 5, alive
Zak is so much alive, still. And I am working hard many moments of the day to stay alive to that, the non-dying part of him. Yesterday I told him it was fine for him to go whenever it was the right time. My friend Margaret told me that was important, just like with people. During the days when it has been hot and humid in Carolina he's been moving slow but the other night his step was lively. Yesterday late afternoon we were outside and he seemed like he didn't want to go far, I had to nudge him down the end of the block and back to the house. As we got closer to home I took him off the leash and he trotted onto the front yard and then began running. In circles. Like he used to do all the time. Like the way that made people think he must have some Greyhound in him. Well, this time it was really only one big circle but it was a run and he seemed so elated and almost proud afterwards, even as he was panting. And I just watched with a happy jaw hanging open. Okay bud, I get it. You. Are. Still. Here.
Day 4, death
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I've lost people to death. The first was my grandfather; I was in high school. I remember being in awe at how Jews rallied around each other in death, how people showed up with food and hugs and prayer books, a kind word, even a patronizing pat was fine. I think I must have thoughts this is how everyone handles death, right up IN it, no fear, moving through the awkwardness. I lost one grandmother and a few years later the other, and in between a series of people who were political allies, work friends, fellow activists. Death played a hand in my decision to start stone circles. There were too many people dying (both literally and figuratively) and we didn't seem to be winning. I got curious about other options.
Death isn't really ever more than a couple arms lengths away; it hovers, sometimes in the background for awhile. But I've learned the older you get, the more you come to know death. It stands to reason - you know more people and they, and you, are all getting older. Death seems to be a lonely hunter, universal but so so particular. There's just no way to know much about another persons anguish, what will set it off and what it touches inside. I've seen, as many of us have, people go through the unfathomable pain of losing a child to illness or suicide or tragedy. There are political deaths, senseless deaths, hidden deaths, accidental deaths.
And yet right now, for me, there is only this one.
Day 3, care & carelessness
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I have found it easy to care for Zak and found joy in the caring but I see now how there have been so many small moments of carelessness. And if so with him, so too I know with others I love. Stepping on a paw, unaware of him in the space. Not fully seeing him. The times when I stopped petting him long before he was ready; I needed to move on to other things. All so normal in the course of normal life. But we're not in normal life any more and each moment is the chance for more presence, more attention, more now, not later. Today I'm just wondering, can I bring some sacredness to each walk, each feeding, each touch. It must be possible.
Sweet friend Ellen (and Zak's second human really) sent me this from Mary Oliver's book Dog Songs which I'd given her last Christmas. There are more complicated things to write about Zak and I and mistakes I have made but not today.
The Sweetness of Dogs, Mary Oliver
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What do you say, Percy? I am thinking
of sitting out on the sand to watch
the moon rise. It's full tonight.
So we go
and the moon rises, so beautiful it
makes me shudder, makes me think about
time and space, makes me take
measure of myself: one iota
pondering heaven. Thus we sit, myself
thinking how grateful I am for the moon's
perfect beauty and also, oh! how rich
it is to love the world. Percy, meanwhile,
leans against me and gazes up into
my face. As though I were just as wonderful
as the perfect moon.
Day 2
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Up in the middle of the night for a couple hours last night. There's a lot of poetry out there about dying pets and it's dreadful but there I was, reading and crying. I'm aware of Zak's reaction when I cry. It alarms him, though less than it used to, and he's less inclined toward action than before. But he notices and this alone is enough to have me contain when possible. It's a reminder that this transition is about me and about him and sometimes what we each need might not easily mesh, in which case his needs should come first.
Have had a lot of work today and that's good, so much else to think about. But when the phone call ends or the email is sent, my eyes land back on this particular creature, my beloved, my complicated but enduring companion. The grip that inevitably accompanies death and dying enters my body. There's such a gap, at least for now, between the now Zak - the one who continues to track my every move, who likes to eat grass, who would have liked to chase that cat - and the one he is becoming. The one we are all becoming.
Day 1 - May 8
I'll remember this day as one of the worst of my life. I hadn't thought too much of the visit to the vet or prepared for the worst. I felt a sense of okayness driving over but the minute I stepped into the vet's office, I was overcome with dread. And when I glimpsed Dr. Cheyney from afar I knew things definitely were. not. okay. I was completely unprepared for the diagnosis and prognosis. I remember him explaining the degree and spread of the cancer - both kidneys, the liver, the bladder. I remember asking for the box of tissues. I remember he hugged me. And I remember he brought Zak in and he was full of energy, happy to see me, eager to get the hell out of there. That was two of us.
The rest of the day and night were a blur. The only person I could talk to was Ada, our other vet, my dog whisperer, a trusted friend on Zak's journey. I said much of what I needed: to stay connected with the non-dying part of Zak (so big!), to explore holistic medicine to keep him strong and comfortable as long as possible, to figure out the logistics of our summer, to find a word for the very last stage - the one where someone sticks needles in him and his spirit flies free into the ethers and I figure out what to do with the body. Ada told me he'd be okay with some travel for now as long as he's got good care, there's plenty of good holistic medicine around for dogs and that at the end I'll know when the time is right.




