My Good Friday was especially black this year. My two dogs got lost out behind our place in a freak Spring blizzard and ended up not coming home Friday night. Saturday noon, my younger, stronger dog limped on in, visually shaken and very hungry. My old guy, Badger, wasn't with her though.
Since the storm had ended and I knew her tracks would be strong and fresh I headed out to see of I could find Badger by re-tracing Susie's steps.
That darn dog. I followed her tracks many miles, farther and farther away from home--over 3 ridges, down thru many gullies and traversing several mtn's until, on a south-facing slope, I ran out of yesterday's snow and prints. I figure the two of them got dis-oriented in the blizzard and ended up farther from home than they realized, and then ran into a pack of coyotes. Susie, being young and quick (she was bred to be a sled dog) got away, but Badger, still strong, but also thirteen years old, was most likely worn down and then pulled down.
Today, after Easter Service, my daughter, Anna, was adamant about going out with me one last time and looking for Badger. I wasn't even hopeful that we'd find him alive, but even finding what's left of him would be helpful...at least we'd know for sure what happened.
The day's gift was not finding a dog--it was finding within me the ability to be there for my daughter. Sitting under a grand, old ponderosa pine on a ragged ridgeline, I held her tight in my lap as she sobbed.
Not many words, but the ones I did speak were good ones, I think. Ones of how pain comes with love, how there's no escaping this fact, but that pain won't kill you and that there's learning available there.
And for me, too. Learning how to be father, but also spectator. That some times--many times--there are no answers, and there is no way to avoid the sting that comes with living.
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