9:18 a.m. -- Dog Days

It’s June, my favorite month, so let’s celebrate with some flowers! 🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

Okay, now to the blog!

Now, if you know me, I’m not exactly the aggressive type. In fact, there are very few instances in my life when I can remember being intentionally physically aggressive. One of them happened in third grade. My brother's two friends were in our treehouse messing around with my puppy, a tiny ball of black curly fur. At first they were just being annoying. Then one of them shot a Nerf dart at her. She let out a sharp squeak and something snapped inside me.

I scrambled up the ladder, bit the Nerf-gun-shooter, and shoved both boys off the treehouse. Looking back, it sounds ridiculous. But I remember the feeling clearly. It wasn't anger as much as it was protection. The moment my puppy cried out, she stopped being a dog and became something I loved that needed defending.

I haven't bitten anyone since (so far). But my attachment to my dogs has never gone away.

As I get older, I think one of the things I will miss most when I leave for college isn't just my family or my friends. It's my dogs.

People sometimes tell me, "They're just dogs, Emma."

But they aren't.

They're the friends who sat beside me while I cried over things that felt catastrophic at eleven. They greeted me after bad days and good days with exactly the same enthusiasm. They listened to every thought I said out loud when nobody else was around. They're woven into my life so completely that imagining home without them feels impossible.

But I kinda get what people mean when they say I overreacted about this. The entire concept of dogs is kind of irrational when you think about it. You spend money on them. Time on them. You clean up after them. You rearrange your schedule around them. You worry about them.

And in return? You get maybe thirteen years. Then one day, they die. Buying a dog is, in some ways, agreeing to an inevitable future heartbreak.

My oldest dog turns ten this year. Her muzzle is dusted with gray now. She doesn't run beside me on jogs anymore. Sometimes I'll look at her sleeping and be struck by a thought that feels almost unbearable. One day, there will be a last walk. A last car ride. A last time she rests her head on my lap. And for a moment, I find myself wondering why humans—why I— do this to ourselves.

Why invite loss into our lives? Why love things that are temporary?

From a practical perspective, it makes very little sense. Love makes us vulnerable. It gives other people the ability to hurt us, even unintentionally. Love creates fear. Fear of distance. Fear of change. Fear of loss.

If our goal were simply self-preservation, we would avoid attachment altogether. We would move through life lightly. We would never need to miss anyone. We would never need to grieve.

But that's not how humans work. We spend our entire lives forming attachments despite knowing exactly how the story ends. Every friendship eventually changes. Every child grows up. Every parent grows older. Every dog dies. Every version of home eventually disappears. And somehow, despite all of this, we continue loving. Maybe because the alternative is worse.

This morning, I woke up at two in the morning to drive my brother to the airport. He's spending the summer working in San Francisco. I didn't cry when we dropped him off at college. But I cried today. It’s because college felt temporary–school, y’know. But summer’s when you spend your time at home. But, this year, my home isn’t his home. 

On the drive home, I found myself thinking about elementary school. Mama stirring soup in the kitchen. Dada watching television. My brother building Legos on the floor. Me sitting in my room drawing. None of us were doing anything extraordinary. In fact, if you had asked me then, I probably would have called it an ordinary day. But now I think those ordinary days may have been some of the most beautiful moments of my life. Home felt permanent. Of course, it wasn't. Nothing is. I think nostalgia will be the end of me. 

Today, I had a selfish thought. If I didn't love my brother so much, this wouldn't hurt. If I cared less about my family, leaving for college would be easier. If I loved my dogs less, aging wouldn't scare me. If I could somehow lower the volume on all my attachments, life would become much less painful. Maybe I should try to hate everyone before I leave, or they leave. If I could just stop loving, I could save myself from a lot of hurt. 

And maybe that's true. But I also think that this hurt is worth it. The depth of your grief is a reflection of the depth of your love. The reason losing a dog hurts so much is because, for years, that dog made my life better. The reason saying goodbye to my brother hurts is that his presence made home feel whole. The reason nostalgia aches is because the past contained something precious. Pain is proof that love existed.

I’ve viewed heartbreak as the price we pay for loving. But instead, maybe love is the reward, and grief simply comes attached as an inseparable pair. And if that's true, then I would choose it every time.

I would choose the dogs. I would choose the family dinners. I would choose the crowded car rides and airport goodbyes. I would choose every future heartbreak that comes from loving people deeply.

Because one day, when my dogs are gone and my family is scattered across different cities and my childhood home exists only in memory, I don't think I'll regret loving too much.

I think I'll be grateful that I had something worth missing.

After all, the most painful losses are often evidence of the greatest gifts.

Cheers,

emma