Open Letter to a Puppy: Bottoms Up (for Sis, with Love and Squalor)
My better two-thirds,
Today you are both three years old. Happy birthday! Drinking age!
I must keep that pace in mind. We fancy our “birthday months” on this end of the mammalian spectrum. You are toasting three years in one day on this planet. So let us raise a paw high:
Jadie, my mocha heart. You once cast those golden eyes for assurance and attention. Now you gaze them when I need either. Or both. Or all.
Charlie, you are the surprise co-pilot. A rescue pit/beagle (peagle?) once suspicious of men, now you fight the temptation to jump into laps. You are up for any ride, down for any walk. Or either. Or both. Or all.
You two have seen me back to my feet, and made good your pledge to retake the park. Though, you still whimper on every approach there, as if we would somehow forget it. Every visit is Just. That. Crucial.
In the spirit of Harold and Maude, I didn’t get you anything. We all know where it would wind up, anyway. Instead, let me tell you how much you matter.
In our three years, you have taught me maths beyond time’s relativity. You have shared your Work-Life Theorem, the 7-Second Anger Rule, and the upside of any tennis ball. You have taught me the Canine Equation: that every dog deserves a human, though the formula does not always work in reverse. Yet I’ll be damned if I can find any bitterness.
What do you give a gift? How do you celebrate a celebration?
Beats me, but belly up to the bar, young adults. This wine-dipped rawhide is on the house. And have I got some great stories to tell you about your aunt Caroline.
Open Letter to a Kid Sister
My kid sister never cared for this place. Last night, she left it.
Authorities say the autopsy won’t arrive until Tuesday, but the cause of death doesn’t really matter. A lifelong smoker who struggled with C.O.P.D., addiction and cutting, Caroline was codependent on sorrow. She often resided in melancholy memories polished in rose-colored wire rims.
But god could she love.
Especially the small, young things. She was a foster mom for the state of Georgia for more than a decade and a volunteer at the animal shelter in Charleston, South Carolina, where she lived with my mom.
Caroline was in the process of adopting one of those foster kids when my father died in 2014 — and my sister lost whatever momentum that was left.
Still, she taught French at an elementary school right up until her death at 55. I hope the kids know they gave her a reason for so many sunrises.
As big a dog lover as I, Caroline once nearly crashed us to pull to the side of a Georgia highway to pick up an abandoned 140-pound Rottweiler we passed. It took $500 and mom’s screen porch, but she saved Mitchell (so named for the highway that dumped him).
If it wasn’t with something furred, the only way to get Caroline’s attention was with a Tom Waits song. She loved his boozy, broken hearted serenades, all loud and proud and growly on stage. Half my gifts to her must have been his music or face plastered on mugs and t-shirts.
On the night she died, Caroline sent a text:
“New fave Tom Waits lyric, dedicated to you:“I’ma love you ‘til the wheels come off””
Wheels are off, sis. I’ll see you there.
