Yeager teaching me how to sit...

Last year my father took ill. He is ninety and really doesn't have much gas in the tank since his heart operation in 2007. He is aware though, but likes to stay in bed most of the day.

It was about March of 2009 i had realized he seemed to like staying in bed more than he liked being up. He didn't complain of pain and his memory had gotten better since i'd been giving him many suppliments for memory, Prevegen had been the one that seemed to smack him in the head and jarred something in his memory.

Yet, he continued to just lay there...

Yeager not one for much flolicking much those days too stayed mostly in his room laying near the door so as to keep an eye on me across the hall in my office, and my dear old mother mom, age 86 at the time, in the living room.

He lay there with the door jam against his back or a desk or something to give the illusion of being in a pack.

He lay there for my dad as he seemed to have very little life in his body. I would have never thought my dad would have outlived Yeager.

Anyway, Yeager didn't say anything. He didn't bark. He didn't cry. He didn't carry on or worry about my dad's condition. He just lay there, keeping him company. Waiting? Maybe waiting...

I don't know for sure. But I do know this...

He knew where he was needed and filled that space.

I was busy researching and worrying about my parents health and fending off ignorance.

My mother was cooking and worrying about my dad and feeling sorry for herself and torn because of so much
family termoil amongst her 6 songs.

In the midst of all this kaos Yeager lay there quietly. Not a bark to be heard.

And the only interaction he really took part in was the occasional pet and I love you from the caretaker of the family. Me.

When it was his time.

The night Yeager died I cannot say I was as eloquent as he would have been. I sat there in the hall and gave him permission. I didn't mean it. I am crying as I write these sentences. My heart completely open as I said the words,
"If you have to go then go Yeag., I will be fine."

And he stroked out within a half hour of my words to let him go.

I do not know if he would have stuck around if I hadn't given him permission but he was suffering and when your heart is open there is no room for suffering in it.

Yeager died soon after. I sat in the hall. Not a tear while in the process. I was simply a witness.
It was quiet for his heavy breathing and...(i will not comment).

And so he had occomplished his reasons for being...to have me learn how to sit and be witness.

I am in awe of the power of witnessing a soul pass from this plane to another.

I watched it happen. I seen the last breath go in and then out of him.

I am kept up by that image during the night. I am curious to know what I had witnessed in retrospect for having
what seemed so clear to me in the moment.

What had I done other than be there for my friend. My "he's such a good boy!" of a doggie.

He had my heart. He had gotten me and I was able to give him permission to go and to be there when he went away.

It sounds all so competitive in my writing. I know it, but I want to convey something about the wisdom of this dog, this doggie, this being...he knew what to do naturally. I watched him do what he did and learned from it. He was a dog and although had a vocabulary of about fifty words including, "Hey, Tom! I have to go out you dumb shit...what do you want me to do crap on the rug?" He would say all that with a kick of the front or back door, a couple barks and a smile that would melt the coldest of...

And so it goes...as my favorite author would write, Kurt Vonnegut.

What had I learned from my Dog Yeager?

I learned to sit quietly.
I learned to give permission and to be a little less selfish.
I learned about loss...something that will be written about later.
I learned about being a witness
I learned about letting go.