Now, Just A Habit

Heather Too is gone, re-homed if you will. I sent out a plea and got an answer, had a meet-and-greet with the potential new owner and her other little dog in a park for over an hour and a half, and left satisfied that she will be well cared for and her idiosyncrasies tolerated.  Though it's been a week now, I am also convinced she will still be waiting for me to come through the door, for a while at least. But she will adjust well, as she did for us. The new owner had the information needed in the plea I put out online, and best, both she and her husband love lap dogs, and even invite them into their bed at night. She will be warm in every way.

We also miss her, and yet don't. My allergy symptoms are subsiding, and I'm comfortable most days at half the medication dose I'd increased mine to when I needed to try to compensate for her presence. I will start trying to decrease it more to "at need" instead of "daily routine" and see how that goes. I do have other allergies after all. 

We're both glad she's in a home instead of at the county shelter. Driving home from the club just this morning the radio informed its listeners that the shelter currently has 600 dogs in it! I've toured it and I have no idea where they keep them all! Usually their load drops just before Christmas as dogs tend to be high on the gift list. It hasn't happened this year. I would be heartbroken if my allergies resulted in her being there.

As I look around, many things are missing. They left out the door with her, including her kennel and its fuzzy blanket, her dishes, food, treats, the folder with paperwork from vets, her flea control, sweater, leashes with poo bags attached, and whatever else was in there that I can't recall. The hallway no longer is accumulating black clumps of her hair, nor are any other floor sections, though the hall is where they really stood out because they drift toward the walls and you see them on both sides as you pass. More places still need sweeping but I just found where I left the broom and dustpan last time I used it but didn't put it away. (I had intended to keep working, but....)

So now what's left of her is the habits we formed around her. Coming in the door we look for her greeting, check to see she hasn't run out while we bring in groceries. She's not on the top of the sofa looking out the window as we pass by either direction. When we sit down there is no dog waiting to be invited into that newly formed lap where we can keep each other warm, though habit demands we look for her each time, before reaching for a small blanket. It is winter after all, even though our coldest nights so far are in the 40s. 

She isn't in her kennel over by Steve's desk, though we still look for her there, black fur hiding in shadow, nor in her favorite corner of the sofa either. When we stand up and start to move around the house there is no tripping hazard to be watched out for, though we still watch, especially Steve. And I catch myself sometimes not calling out "bedtime" to signal it's time for her to head for my bed and under the covers. Coming out of the shower she's not laying across my pile of clean clothes laid out on the bed, but I still notice.

I catch myself almost reminding Steve that his plate with crumbs on it sitting next to his chair needs to be put out of her reach, remembering it no longer matters. She's not there to sneak whatever off it when backs are turned, sometimes dragging the (paper) plate off into her kennel to hide with her blanket. I no longer have to pick the kennel up and shake everything out since I can't get down on my knees and reach back inside to clean it out.

There are already days when I realize I haven't gone out into the back yard for over 24 hours because I no longer need to, though I have plans once I finish this for a final popper-scooper patrol. I wonder how many rabbits will now be out there nibbling dropped leaves, and whether it will be any different without her popping out since they never really minded her anyway until she came within about three feet of where they were. They were safe before. Are they safer now? Do they still keep an eye out for her wanderings like we still do?

The habits revolving around her are slowly dropping off, getting more infrequent through the day, just not quite gone. We only realize it as we realize something didn't happen, wasn't needed. There is almost a physical absence we still notice. It won't be too much longer until she's really gone, and like other dogs in our lives, just a memory, a tiny smile as we flip through pictures and there one is again, now enough of them that we sometimes have to ask, "What was that one's name again?" I fight the thought that it'll happen with her. Will it be because we share my name? Did she dig her way into our hearts more firmly than some of the others? Or is everything still just too recent, the pain reinforced by the knowledge that there won't be another one because my body finally rebelled and cried, "No more," another ending in an increasing list of endings as our awareness of our own mortality looms out on the horizon.