No, I'm not going crazy. It's just that, after almost 10 years together, Zora and I are finally learning the subtleties of one another's communication styles. With this comes the ability to communicate much more complex concepts than sit, come, and stay. It's like this in any relationship. Even with the assistance of human language, it takes several years to really understand another human in the way Zora and I have grown to understand one another. But when you finally gain real understanding with another person, your time together is just beginning.
And that's the point I'm at with Zora. Because Zora is dying. That's the first time I've said it out loud. She is old and feeble and prefers to spend most of her time in bed these days. I don't know if she has two weeks, two months, or two years, but I know that I'll be saying goodbye to her soon.
I can't bear it. I can't imagine it. Zora has been my truest friend for 10 years. Except for a few exceptions (my honeymoon and a few trips I couldn't take her on), I she has spent every single day with me. Think about that for a second. We spend more time with our dogs than we do with any other human. If I am home, I am with her. Always, without a break, for 10 years. That's more time than I've spent with my husband, my family, my friends, and probably everyone I know combined. That's powerful.
It should come as a shock to precisely no one, then, that with so much time spent together comes a deep and rich history. The photos in this post share the story of my Zora growing from a tiny puppy into a formidable friend and, finally, into a feeble old woman. They also tell my story: how I got her as a pitifully anxious college student whose dad got her a dog because he thought it would calm her the fuck down. These images show her as she learned the basics of being a dog, got a brother, moved 9 times, and grew more into herself each year. They show us both aging (I am aging. I can admit it. Life is little more than the process of aging. You're aging, too). They track my growth from a child who had no idea what she wanted out of life to an adult with a very clear vision, a spouse and very adult responsibilities. To my reader, these are just images -- perhaps touching, perhaps amusing -- on a screen. But Zora and I have lived these images, and all the attendant changes and traumas and triumphs.
Zora was there for my dramatic break-ups and ill-advised rebounds. She watched me flail and beg and plead as a six-year relationship ended. She has witnessed me do pretty much everything I have ever been ashamed of, as well as all of the things I have been proud of. She was there when I met my husband, when I adopted Brody, when I started and graduated college, when my sister and niece were born, and for every single other life event I have experienced for 10 years. Every single one. I can say that about no one else.
We've climbed mountains and played with goats together. She once attacked a predator who tried to break into my apartment. I sleep with her every night. She's witnessed every fight my husband and I have ever had.
And yet Zora will never know most of the things that I consider integral to who I am. She doesn't know that I am a writer, or even that I have a career. Hell, she doesn't know that I can read, or even that reading is a thing one can do. She doesn't know that I'm married, how old I am, my favorite color, what I do all day when I'm driving around. The only memories I have that she knows about are the ones for which she has been present. She isn't aware of a single goal I have, except those I act upon, and even then she can't be sure that my behavior is the result of any particular desire (but, of course, as anyone who's read a lick of psychology knows, knowing another's mind is also a problem humans face, but we decide to get all fancy and call the extreme version of this problem solipsism -- a choice dogs would never make because they're not prone to ridiculous philosophical flights of fancy). She can't share in my love for pink because she can't see pink (note: it's a myth that dogs can't see in color; they just can't see red and green-spectrum light). She has
no idea how much money I make, or how good I am about saving it, or how much I worry about it. She doesn't understand why I have any of the relationships I have or had, has no concept of why she sees some people but others never come back, does not know my proudest achievement or my most shameful act, and could not list a single thing I like.
And that is because she has the good sense to realize -- indeed, her biological and environmental limitations force her to realize -- that it's what you're like, not what you like, that matters. She knows me solely based upon what she has seen me do. And what we do is really the stuff that forms the most core truth about all of us. That's who we are -- not our jobs, our likes, or what we plan to do or hope not to do again. Aristotle was right: "We are what we repeatedly do." Zora sees what I really am and what I'm really not. And she knows my emotions and can't listen to my justifications, so she's a truer psychologist than any that I could hire.
We love our dogs because they see us when no one else can, or will, or wants to, and because they see us for exactly who we are. Miraculously, they seem to love us even though they see all the things we are but wish we weren't. They don't even understand that we can become something different from what we currently are or that some of us spend our lives being someone we're not -- or, at least, convincing ourselves that's what we're doing.
They teach us that love is not about boundaries or silent, seething acceptance. It has nothing whatsoever to do with shared goals or similar tastes in music. Dogs don't care about whether we can pull our financial weight or land an interesting job. They think their friends will be impressed by us no matter
what we do for a living or where we live. They are unconcerned with mutual give and take, with confronting us about our bad behaviors, berating us into becoming who they want us to be, or learning how to forgive us when we violate some minor social nicety. They just don't care, because they live life more correctly, more honestly, and more openly than any of us do. They know that love is nothing more than unflinching, unceasing, day-to-day acceptance. Without fail, they provide us with that for the entirety of their lives.
And that is why I can't imagine saying goodbye to this highly evolved creature that I impiously refer to as my dog. She's better than me. She knows who and what I really am. And she loves me. I hope that I have been able to show her how much I love her.
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