Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Isn't it weird...

how a simple smell can trigger memories of things you forgot years ago? With my allergies, I honestly can't smell at all most of the time but something about my own perfume today is taking me back to high school...and the person I was dating at the time. And no, my perfume isn't that old...and it certainly isn't men's cologne!

It's the same for me with sounds. I went to a coworker's house a few weeks ago and one of her dogs is battling congestive heart failure...we lost Pepper to CHF almost a year ago. Symptoms vary from dog to dog, but one common symptom is the hacking cough caused by fluid in the lungs. It's like the smell of Parvo, once you experience it, you never forget. I heard Lenny before I saw him...the last time I heard that cough was the night Pepper died...but for a split second, I honestly expected to see Pepper come bounding around the corner. Only he didn't. I was crying so hard by the time I made it home that Brandon was sure something awful had happened...and it was that ugly, elementary school, I can't catch my breath kind of crying. You know what I'm talking about. All from the sound of a dog's cough.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

I bought a book in the Dallas airport tonight that I am going to bring you over Christmas. I read it in about half an hour on the plane and had to hold back a flood of tears so as not to scare the people around me.

Its called "Good Dog. Stay." by Anna Quindlen and its mostly about what her dog taught her in his life and death. I was just reminded of this part when I read this post:

"The life of a good dog is like the life of a good person, only shorter and more compressed... Starting out I thought life was terribly complex, and in some ways it is. But contentment can be pretty simple.

And that's what I learned from watching Beau over his lifetime: to roll with the punches (if not in carrion), to take things as they come, to measure myself not in terms of the past or the future but of the present, to raise my nose in the air from time to time and, at least metaphorically, holler 'I smell bacon!'

Sometimes an old dog teaches you new tricks."