Category Archives: grief

June 11, 2025 · 8:20 pm

Love, loss and how will I ever live without dog hair in my life

White dog. Predominantly black wardrobe. Dark wood floors.

It was always a bad judgement call. But on the flip side it was perfect. She marked me. I am her human and she comes wherever I go. (thank you to all of those who let us bring her… especially you cat people , and those with pristinely clean floors before we got there… you know who you are).

If you know me in-person, or where I post ad nauseam about my girl, Iko has been my sidekick for almost 14 years. Rain or shine you will find me 2-3x a day walking the neighborhood with my girl in tow – the best personal trainer of all times. A big quirky girl with her very own mind about who is the pet and who trains who. Unapologetically who she is. From day one she walked to the beat of her own drummer. Fiercely loyal with a side of don’t pester me with expectations. Surely one of the most photographed dogs around.

Who is Iko? What makes her stand out? She is the lover of Archie. Visitor of next door neighbors (mad door knocking skills). The queen of the corner of Salem Lane. Both online and in real life, Iko made her mark on this world and filled mine with the love and companionship that I will forever be grateful for. She came into my life after the great loss of my big love before her, Mel. My first dog. And she filled those paws with grace and her own brand of confidence that always boosted mine when I needed it most.

We have walked this life together through some of the most difficult and joyous times. She holds my greatest secrets and has held me up when I have thought I could not keep going.

And now, my sweet girl, I can see you are done. You gave it your all these past 2 years. With the help of an army of those who loved you fiercely, led by an angel of a Vet who I have followed to the ends of the earth (or East Northport which is sort of the same thing with a sick dog in the back seat), we were graced with what we can never get enough of.

More time.

So now, I will let you go with dignity to go find Mel and all of the other loves I have lost. Say hey to them all for me.

Me? I will walk around with an Iko-sized hole that is just fine because it will remind me that you will always be with me. You are part of my soul.

As for the dog hair… I guess I will have to live without it everywhere.

Godspeed, my sweet girl. Go run free and swim again.

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Filed under aging, dogs, grief, Iko, loss, pets, relationships

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July 8, 2016 · 12:02 pm

On Speaking Out

bubbles
This has never been a political place, and has certainly not been a very active one for a while. But it is where ‘I go’. And today, I had to ‘go’ somewhere. Time to Cry, indeed.

Speaking out. This week’s mantra. All ‘sides’.

Sides? Really?! Now there are sides to humanity? To dignity? To civil rights?  To driving down the road with your child in the back seat? To waking up every day and doing your job protecting your community?

Are there systemic issues? Hell, yeh. Should we push for a drastic overhaul of our broken system that includes real oversight, investigation and punishment? Both ‘sides’. Double hell, yeh. Do we have issues with guns… triple hell, yeh. Are all cops evil? Come on, you don’t believe that any more than you believe that all people of color are criminals. Right?

Tell me right, ok? Make me believe it. Please, come out of the woodwork and tell me that as Americans we can stop taking sides. Tell me that I am not delusional. Tell me that from the wreckage of all this violence we can create change. Not slogans and hashtags. Not turning your profile picture black OR blue. Turn it both. Black and blue… bruised and hurting. That is what we are all feeling.

These are the things I have read today that moved me after a sleepless night. Let them move you. Let’s all turn down the volume and turn up the idea of what being an American should mean. And what our responsibilities are.

  • There are no sides. Please don’t take one. Grieve for loss of life, the broken system and violence begetting violence. But don’t take sides.
  • You know the hardest part of having a conversation surrounding police shootings in America? It always feels like in America… if you take a stand for something, you automatically are against something else. It’s such a strange world to be in. You shouldn’t have to choose between the police and the citizens that they are sworn to protect. (Trevor Noah)
  • Things have not changed, the access to real time video has.
  • An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind. (thank you, Dawn)
  • I’m sorry, I must have set my alarm for 1968 (thank you, Marc)
  • We need to stop thinking hashtags are going to fix the problem and get away from our computers and out into our communities to work together to figure out how to stop this reality we find ourselves in. (C.C. Chapman)

Speaking out is great. But please choose your words wisely. And act upon them. Effectively. Sensibly. And with liberty and justice for ALL.

Amen. Namaste. Shalom. Salaam.

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January 6, 2015 · 3:31 pm

Time to Cry Tuesday – You can’t go home again

540

Cleaning my office the first day back from the holidays, this picture fell out of a file folder onto my keyboard.

The Big 540… my childhood home.

The same house that we sold a few months ago. The process of selling was rather unpleasant, the details remaining unwritten. Use your imagination if you do not know the details. The process of dismantling it was long and arduous, as my parents had lived there for 60 years. But it was a labor of love. By the time we signed on the dotted line it was more of a relief than anything else.

Oddly, a few weeks after closing I had the most bizarre dream. I was showering in my parents’ bathroom and suddenly realized that we no longer owned the house (oops). Yep, wrapped in a towel in someone else’s bathroom and they walked in the back door. The classic version of the ‘I forgot to study for the test’ dream.

A few weeks later I had another dream that I was hanging out in the house and all of the new owners’ relatives started showing up with furniture and started yelling at me and threatening to call the cops. Again, I had forgotten that this was no longer ‘our house’ (yes, I am way crazier than I let on).

I don’t have to be a therapist to know that the loss of this house is obviously effecting me more than I realized. I have never lived without this home – quite something for someone of ‘my age’. This is where I grew up, where the family gathered, where my mom planted. And planted. And planted. Where my history lived in the walls. And although my current home has been in my life almost half as long as this one has, there is something unnerving about losing this place.

I know ‘home’ is not the building. And Lord knows I have brought enough of the stuff from that house here (anyone want to help me go through 14 crates of photos). It is hard to explain how I feel.

Maybe it is simply the knowledge that I can’t go home again.

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Filed under aging parents, grief, homeowner, loss, real estate, Time to Cry Tuesdays

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