Dogs

I came across this passage on FB and it made me think of Sasha, our old family dog who left us decades ago.

“Dogs lives are short, too short, but you know that going in. You know the pain is coming, you're going to lose a dog, and there's going to be great anguish, so you live fully in the moment with her, never fail to share her joy or delight in her innocence, because you can't support the illusion that a dog can be your lifelong companion. There's such beauty in the hard honesty of that, in accepting and giving love while always aware that it comes with an unbearable price. Maybe loving dogs is a way we do penance for all the other illusions we allow ourselves and the mistakes we make because of those illusions.”

― Dean Koontz, The Darkest Evening of the Year

Crossing Paths in Grief

Two girls growing up in the same city,
Going to the same primary school,
With paths never crossing in childhood,
Both making a life in a foreign land,
Each having a child in 1993, one girl, one boy,
Both destined to lose those children, 46 months apart,
Both children taking their own lives, in the same way,
One in the comfort of her home, the other in the eerie darkness of the woods,
One grieving for her beautiful daughter, Shahdi,
The other, Shahdi, grieving for her handsome son, Dara,
Getting to know each other for the first time after decades,
Through the involuntary membership in "The Unfortunate Mothers Club",
Both asking fate about the hand they were dealt with,
Both facing unanswered questions and grief till eternity.