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I pretty much gave up on Andre’s dad. He has lung cancer and still smokes ( between chemo treatments) and he’s a type 1 diabetic who doesn’t take care of himself. Last year he suffered a compound fracture of the ankle and it’s still not healing properly. I think he likes the attention.. even the negative kind. The bad part is that his wife and Andre are the ones who are suffering because he’s a jerk. It took me about a year to write him off. I thought he was being an ass because he wasn’t feeling well and it turned out that being a DIK is his normal SOP. I have however learned to just keep my mouth shut…. so Andre and I don’t fight over it. Lol
Yeah, and in a situation like this, I definitely think you made the right call.
The one we're looking at is that Dad was very much there and supportive to my husband throughout his life (lots of money) but he is just...a man of a certain generation. He feels comfortable talking in gentler ways with me, he's sweet to strangers, but in dealings with other men...with his son... Well. He hates that he is being a burden of any kind to us, he did not really want us to come down here, but he needs us whether he likes it or not. And he doesn't.
I get it, it's hard to accept. I mean, he's spent his life as a very capable man. This can't be easy for him.
But I don't think that he understands (or is OK with, really) that his son is a sensitive and conflict averse person who has a tough time dealing with being yelled and cussed at, especially over small misunderstandings.
Weather was nice today, we went to a park near our house. We watched the little kids playing soccer. Looked like organized leagues were playing as new teams were coming and going. Squirrels also provided some entertainment too. They were running around acting crazy.
We never had kids but it was nice to see families out and about watching the kids playing. It's like a little slice of Americana.
Maybe not the happiest comment. I needed to write this somewhere.
Two weeks ago at about 8:45 pm I was 5 minutes from my GF's place. Almost home. It'd been a warm day between summer and autumn and the night was just cool enough. Windows down, radio on, my thoughts dreamily 5 minutes ahead. Then the car ahead of me swerved around something, and animal or hopefully a bag of clothes or large sofa cushion in the road. I checked for oncoming cars quickly and seeing none I slowed down and eased into the left lane. Rolling past slowly the form in the road took the recognizable shape of a person. A dead one, but a person. Who was then run over by the car following me. Maybe that was unavoidable, but they never stopped and that makes me wonder, about a lot of things. That sound, the quick thump followed by another at about the instant I realized what I was witnessing, will stay with me for a while.
So will my thoughts as I sat with the man's dog on the side of the road. He was a big male malamute, a doggo I knew and had pet before as he walked near my GF's place. As dog people often do I recognized him before his owner who lay in the road. His name was Herman and he was a sweet, easy dog as big dogs so often are, threatened by little besides disease and maybe cars.
The dog was standing when I got to him but he sat awkwardly and then rose again favoring his right hind leg. I sat on the curb and looked into his sad questioning eyes, me all wise and without so much as a sliver of an answer for him. I patted the curb and he laid down next to me and a deep, primal moan poured from his huge lungs. He raised his head and looked at me one more time and I rubbed his ears until his eyes rolled a bit, which is my go to move with dogs. I told him he was a good boy.
He laid his head down on my thigh and we both looked in the direction of the body in the road, now covered in a blanket the first cop on the scene had provided. I wonder what the dog saw, or whether he saw anything. I saw the hole in people's lives and dogs lives the twisted body on the pavement represented. When I had checked for a pulse the body was warm still and from the neck down it was a mess. Thankfully the man's face was mostly undisturbed. I was comforted by that, a bit for myself but especially for whoever would identify him. They still do that, don't they? A wife, a son or daughter, a sibling. For someone's last look at the man they had loved before all the disguising that happens prior to burial. For being spared worse.
When the dog had moaned I briefly thought that he wailed for his loss, for the absurdity of all this. I guess I hoped that. Quickly as I sat with him though I knew his cry was the beginning of his end. I had seen the car that had struck them and it appeared the man had rolled up the hood and caved in the windshield, which looked like an egg shell. There was a bit of fur and blood on the grill. I could see some blood on the pavement next to Herman and I felt some as I stroked his head and neck. I had asked a cop and a firefighter if there was anything we could do, and they said it would have to wait. Anyway, the nearest animal hospital was 30 minutes away, and he wouldn't have made it.
So we sat there, a once strong dog and a once strong man reduced to watching a body lifeless in the road and another life ebbing, helpless to do anything. Herman's breath soon slowed and I leaned to look in his eyes but they were closed. I watched his broad back rise and fall in rhythm with the night. Every 3-4 breaths his back rose less, and then not at all. I picked up his proud head and let it fall heavy on my leg.
... That is...that is some heartbreaking stuff right there, Homina. I am deeply sorry that you went through that, yet in an odd way I feel that you were like a kind of angel, a good soul to stop and be there to bear witness for the passing of this neighbor and his good dog. I think you at least were able to give the dog comfort.
We all must pass one day, no doubt. A bit of kindness at the end is more than many of us living things ever get, you know?
I nearly wonder if this is a timely message as it intersects with something that I'm dealing with now, my senior father in law who very much believes he should still be able to drive his Cadillac, when probably he should not. It is making me think, anyways.
Oh, I'm so sorry, that is tragic. I can't imagine.
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That is the worst feeling, homina. The only time I ever shed it tear when when a dog breathes their last breath. It never gets any easier. The worst when you leave them behind. The last several years I have had them cremated and the ashes returned to me. I have a spot on the shelf for them. The void they leave is vast.
Usually another dog in need of a home finds me. And it is rinse and repeat.
A storm is rolling through now. We were not supposed to receive any snow here. Now there are about 3 inches of heavy wet snow. The leaves have not completely fallen. I keep hearing a maple tree crack and pop. There is some thunder and lighting. At the office the branches were drooping. One right over my brand need Jeep that is my work car. I do not want anything to happen to it.
Omg, I'm so sorry, homina. This is absolutely horrible, awful. The only good thing I can think of is that they both passed doing something they loved together, I assume, one of their regular walks? And that you showed both of them some dignity at the end.
We once witnessed a dog being hit by a car, and I won't go into all the details but we watched the poor thing bleed out in front of us and others who had stopped to try and help. The car that hit her kept going. As we were all gathered around her, the car drove by us in the other direction and shouted, "Sorry!" out the window as they went by. She was a beautiful black dog, and the thing that stuck with me is that as we were all trying to soothe her, she wagged her tail at us even as she was dying. Your story reminded me of this.
As Chow said to me, you surely have some level of PTSD from this. I can't imagine the onslaught of all that you witnessed. I know you can never forget it, but I hope that immediate, sick feeling will slowly fade. Wishing you well.
Oh, God, homina. I'm so sorry. I hope you have someone you can speak to about this trauma, professionally or otherwise.
It's horrifying to think that the man and the dog were hit by multiple vehicles and they didn't even stop. I hit a squirrel once and was sickened and shaken up by it.
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...yippppeee
