{"id":1320412,"date":"2020-06-08T23:24:00","date_gmt":"2020-06-09T05:24:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/chacos-column-dealing-with-death\/"},"modified":"2020-06-08T23:24:00","modified_gmt":"2020-06-09T05:24:00","slug":"chacos-column-dealing-with-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/chacos-column-dealing-with-death\/","title":{"rendered":"Chacos column: Dealing with death"},"content":{"rendered":"
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One reason I love having pets is for the lessons they selflessly provide. Their eventual demise always tugs the heart hard, though. My children were too young to say goodbye to Lulu, the twelve-year-old dumpster-diver who crossed the highway one fateful evening in search of trashy vittles. I didn\u2019t tell the kids a car hit our beloved \u201cfirst child\u201d because she didn\u2019t look both ways before crossing the street. Instead, my husband and I spoke in generic terms our toddlers could swallow. We knew they would undoubtedly feel the weight of sadness and loss our home would hold for many months. At the time, that was enough.<\/p>\n

Over the years we\u2019ve said goodbye to a gecko, 3 parakeets, a cat, and too many goldfish to count. Each had a funeral service befitting the occasion while taking into consideration the emotional bandwidth our little ones could tolerate. Therefore, some goodbyes were a few parting words with a flush and a swirl around the bowl. We learned floating fish required little fuss and an albino lizard was okay to put up for adoption. Five-year-olds can be overwhelmingly sad one moment and ask for a pet turtle the next.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, birds needed more fanfare. For one feathered friend, we hosted a formal burial during a Super Bowl halftime show. We crammed in a eulogy, hummed taps, added some afterlife trinkets to the coffin, and staked a small headstone next to the garden. We were back inside serving nachos before the second half of the game commenced. At the time, I was confident we were doing enough.<\/p>\n

Our sly cat took off one day and never looked back. We\u2019ve had sightings of her taunting us with what appeared to be a snarky grin smeared on her face. But in the year and a half since she\u2019s been declared \u201cmissing,\u201d I\u2019ve used the time to have more thoughtful conversations about the indelible mark loss leaves on your heart. Time eases their pain, but not their sorrow. Cats are brutal creatures, mercilessly careless with human emotions.<\/p>\n

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