Waiting It Out

Got to work through the emotions
Remembering it hits each of us differently
Isn’t it strange the peace some feel
Even as others break down into tears
For parting is more than sweet sorrow

Strength To Carry On

Remember each moment that’s gone by
Even as you say farewell
Grief lets you know of the love
Rent from you by the veil
Each precious moment a shining star
Taking your heart as they fell

I was told once that you know you’re an adult when you have to make your own doctor appointments. I’ve found that, though this is true, it’s also…not.

You know you’re an adult when you have to schedule a final appointment for a beloved, but slowly dying family pet.

Just remember that your love for them can keep you warm after they’ve gone ahead.

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The Whole

May you find your peace with this. May we all. — Hercules Poirot

It’s hard trying to move on when you’ve lost something, or someone. Or even when you’ve left behind a specific point in your life. Getting up and making the choice, again and again, to just keep going can be one of the most difficult things to do. Some have said that it gets easier the more you do so, and sometimes that’s true.

Sometimes it makes it harder, though, because you’re just so tired of getting up, again and again.

And then there are the times you think you’re going to lose someone irreplaceable. You have to prepare yourself for it, because it’s going to come and you know it. You know it. You brace yourself against the pain, knowing that it likely won’t make that much of a difference when it comes because losing someone like this is never going to stop hurting.

Sometimes you get a miracle, and they live. The relief in that moment is indescribable. you’ve braced yourself, telling yourself that you’ll get through the pain, knowing that such thoughts are gentle lies at best, only to find them not needed at all.

Sometimes…

Sometimes the miracle isn’t a relief for you, but rather a relief for them. A relief from their pain and suffering.

You learn that the bracing doesn’t help as much as you told yourself it would. You learn that even though you’re able to keep getting up, again and again, the hurt comes back in waves in little unexpected moments.

But…

But you remember wonderful things in those same moments as well.

So take the time to mourn, but don’t let your grief be all about sorrow. Let it be about the whole of the life lived, the good and the bad.

Mother of Pearl

Poor the earth remains at her loss
Even as others mourn
A moment in my memory stands
Real to me as this point in time
Life and love shared in equal measure

A wonderful woman has passed this day. A woman who gave love to all within her reach, whether they were deserving of it or not. In her eyes, all deserved love and care.

She was not mine, but that didn’t stop her from loving me all the same.

She had known pain and sorrow and instead of letting it destroy her, she let it polish that which was good within her.

Grimoire Valentine 2016-2017

Ready for you to leave, we were not

In fact, you will be missed most dearly

Perhaps you will finally get some sleep

 

—–

One of my eldest nephew’s pet bunnies passed away last night. Grimoire Valentine, we will miss you dearly. Especially your pal, Vincent, who loved to play tag with you. (Grim always won even though he was ten times smaller than Vincent.) Grim was a calm and always tired bunny.

Tough Morning – Thankful Thursday

This morning was really hard for me. My sister woke me up before she had to leave to take her kids to school and then head to work to let me know that one of our goats had died in the night.

One of the baby goats, the little bucklings that were born in August and were still small enough to pick up and hold.

We didn’t really know why he had died.

I went through my morning chores: laundry, dishes, checking on the animals and their waters. (Everything freezes over multiple times throughout the day because the temperature is always below the freezing point of water right now.)

I did all of this while crying, because I am a crier, but still able to work even when doing so.

I felt the need to call a friend who also has goats (and has kind of been our go-to person whenever we have goat issues that crop up.) She came right over and listened to me before checking on the only little goatling we have left. She let me know that in the cold weather, most goats’ digestive track slows incredibly fast and it’s very easy for them to become bloated and if they are headbutted (which is how goats play) and it hits them just wrong (which is a worry mostly for the smaller ones that aren’t quite 5 or 6 months old yet, which our two youngest goatlings turn 5 months around Christmas) they can rupture something and die. Being bloated also makes it harder for them to keep warm because it hurts to cuddle up with others if you are too bloated.

My friend was actually surprised that the smaller of the two goatlings had survived the last few nights with how small he is and how bloated he was.

“Those other buckling must really like this one, the only way he could have survived the last few nights was if he was cuddled up with them even when he didn’t want to be.” she told me.

I thought back on it and I did recall that Cowboy and Ventus (our next two youngest after the little ones, but they are closer to 7 months old) do like the little tri-colored goatling that survived.

My friend showed me how to hold the little goatling and pat at his stomach to help him burp out all of the gas that was keeping him bloated. She also showed me how to use a pinch of baking soda every couple of hours to help him to burp without me. (It works kind of like Alka-Seltzer for a goat.) She also told me that just a milliliter and a half of regular human yogurt can help to encourage the good bacteria that’s in his digestive track to start working more, helping him to digest his food better and not end up with all of that gas in him.

She’s also going to come back in a few hours and have a look at my little goatling to make sure he’s doing okay.

That was a really long way to come to, to find what I was grateful for today.

What I’m grateful for was my friend who was willing to come down and help me even when she didn’t know what was wrong. Because I was still crying too much to explain beyond the fact that we had lost a goat in the night. She made sure I was all right and then immediately checked my other goats (while showing me how to do so as well) to make sure they were okay and when she found one that needed care and attention she showed me how to do it and then stayed with me for a bit longer to make sure I not only knew how to do it, but that I wasn’t alone.

I am very blessed to have such a friend.

Check out the original Thankful Thursday.

Not Goodbye

My heart beats unevenly

Only to choke me on my breath

Reality is not my friend now

Taking the small figure in shaking hands

And leaning over the too stillness to cry

Letting parts of prayer soothe the ache

 

The first time I had an animal die on the farm, it wasn’t just one. It was a whole litter of seven little bunnies. I sat and held their mother and cried all over her. I think she took it a lot better than I did, though she let me cry into her soft fur for over thirty minutes after Sissy (dog) had abandoned me for somewhere with less excitement. (Sissy doesn’t take people being upset very well…or at all…she hates crying and yelling with a passion and will leave the house to get away from it if she has to.)

The next three times it happened all I could think about was how I was always the one to find the bunnies after they’d died instead of anyone else.

By the sixth time, it was a goose that had been sick and not adjusting to its new home well.

Each time it happened (bunnies, bunnies, bunnies, goatling, bunnies, chickens, geese, chickens, bunnies, more bunnies, we have a lot of bunnies…) I would wrap the body (except for the goose) in bags and say a small prayer before burying the bodies in the only place available at the time (the garbage, because the ground freezes really hard). I still don’t like it when one of the animals dies, but I know that this life isn’t the end, so that when they die they aren’t vanishing while leaving only a body that will crumble and decay behind. No, they’ve gone somewhere else.

This isn’t the end of it for them, nor is it the end of this for us.

There is more. What we each believe that more is will change, but there is something there and I take comfort in that.

This isn’t a goodbye, just a see you later.

Re-visit of Dungeon Prompt: Mortality and the Human Psyche.

She Was My Aunt

I had not seen her in years

Her hair was gray

Though it had always been that way

At least to me

You see

Her face was lined and aged

Her glasses long gone away

Her eye sight remained true

And she still knew

Who she was talking to

But now she’s gone

Though not alone

She’s preceded by others she loves

And now she’ll be born away

Upon the wings of doves

---

My aunt passed away August 1, 2015 in the late afternoon, though we did not hear of it until the following Sunday. She’s my mother’s only sister and though they had not been close for a number of years, we had started visiting with her more in the last few years when my cousin Rebecca died. Mom was able to visit her sister one last time before she passed.

No matter what has happened in the past, she was my aunt.

You Will Be Missed

There has never been a time in my life where President Packer wasn’t sitting up on the stand waiting patiently for his turn during General Conference. Hearing his voice speaking was always very soothing no matter how upset I had been before.

The time you spent

Here with us

Has quite quickly flown by

Missed, you will be

But we know

That there are others

Who have missed you just as much

So enjoy this time you have with them

And Bless you for the time we had with you.

In Honor of President Boyd K. Packer

Frozen

Not certain just what to do

Understanding has deserted me

My thoughts are frozen and blank

But there must be something I can do!

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Three of Maggie’s litter have died within the first 24 hours of their lives. These are my thoughts.

EDIT: The rest of her litter have passed away. I’m the only one at home at the moment and the next ones to be home will be the kids. I read once that killing someone in defense of your home and your family was easier than killing one of the animals that you had raised from an infant for food. I don’t know where I stand on that debate, but I think I’m starting to understand it a little after today.