This picture my wife made to remember the pets we’ve lost over the year breaks my heart. Not just for the loss it represents, I still miss each of these animals.
It breaks my heart because I was with each one of them when they were put to sleep. I stroked their heads as they fell unconscious and took their last breaths. Each one of them entered the vets on a particular day trusting I would care for them and ultimately bring them home like I did every other time.
I know with each of them I did the right thing, I always say we’re more humain to our pets then we are to ourselves and our loved. With us we let disease and injury ravage us until our bodies can no longer cope and we die.
I know we did the right thing but every time I leave the vets I’m plagued by the thought that in the end I betrayed their trust, I let them down. I should have made them better, I should have brought them home.
Loss and guilt always, and it never seems to go. It taints all my memories of the pets I’ve lost. The last memory with them is the first that comes to my mind – however fleetingly – every time I think of them.
We have Banjo left, after that I think I’m done. I’m not sure how much more loss and guilt I can take.
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