I think the spiritual part of my life with dogs and other animals is learning how to communicate with them. I do not believe they speak in our words, or feel our emotions. They have their own language, their own way of feeling.  There is an overwhelming drive to hear what we wish, what we need.  It is my task to understand this, as they use their profound instincts to understand us. They know more, I think, about us than we do about them, because they are less arrogant than we are,  less selfish and self-absorbed.

So I am learning to communicate with them by listening, continuing the process of active listening I began to learn in hospice work with Izzy.

Rose has never looked at the camera for me, but she did all day Friday, her last day. And I have been thinking about her look, her message to me. I am listening and hearing it, I think,  a message in her spirit, her purpose.

This is what I saw, and heard:

I came when you needed me, she said, and it is time for me to leave. I will not be returning, crossing over to the human spirit world, not crossing any bridge with you, or joining you for eternity. Our work together is over.  I have other work to do, for, as you have sensed, I am a spirit who lives inside the body of a dog, and I have never belonged only to the material world. We come when we are needed, we go when we are ready. I am ready. You are ready.

I know you well, have seen and smelled and sensed your emotions, many of them hidden so deeply when I came to you.  I know you are hiding them now, as I smell and see your sadness and struggle. I came to ground you when you needed that, came to make you feel safe in this place while you left the familiar behind and gave birth to your new life. That was always my work. The sheep were just a part of it.

I saw the sorrow, fear and pain in you and I have stood beside you and watched over  you until you came to your own life, to real connection, to Maria, to the work you were meant to do and the life you were meant to live. I have seen you begin to heal, sensed that.  I did not come to be your true partner in life – Maria and you have found one another for that – or to  cuddle with you – Lenore will do that. Or to protect you. Frieda has come to do that work. We are all spirits in our own way, magical helpers come to guide you on your way. Simon will stir your heart and inspire your work and sound the call to life. The chickens will challenge you to see the beauty and simplicity in all life.

You always called it the Hero’s Journey. I have no name for such things. It was just my work,  the faithful spirits of animals in  service to people for all eternity. I have no understanding of grief, guilt, agony or confusion.  Those are your feelings, not mine. I am not a hero. I am not in grief or sorrow at departing.  I did my job.  I do my work. It is my destiny, my devotion, my steadiness of purpose.

And our work will continue, in your life, in your work, in the next chapters of your life. And in the way you work, where I will forever be a part of the stories you tell, the spirit that infuses your life and reminds you to live it.  Other people, other animals, other spirits will rise to help you, if you let them, as you let me. We are not about grieving you and I, not about loss. You will not waste your hours in regret.  You will grieve for a time, and them I will fade, and be a ghost in your mind, a breeze, a shaft of light.  We are another  love story, timeless and joyous, a light unto the world.

You can see in my face that I am saying goodbye. I call upon you to take care of yourself, and continue our work, which is forever and ever. You believe in your heart that the divine lives in heartbreak and confusion and loss. So it lives in purpose and love and affirmation.

I leave you now to live your life, fully and meaningfully, as you wished so badly to do.  Your life has just begun, and I know you will not waste it again, or threw away one precious day.  And remember what you read to me when you took me up to the top of the hill when I first came to you, and think of it now:

And so I did, I found and  pulled out the book,  St. Augustine’s City Of God and the tattered songs and prayers I used to read to Rose and the dogs up at the top of the hill, when I was broken and alone with her and them, and I think this is what Rose meant. It was right at the top of the pile, in a folder marked “City Of God/Awake From Your Slumber.”

“Awake from  your slumber! Arise from your sleep!

A new day is dawning for all those who weep.

The people in darkness have conquered the night.

May our tears be turned into dancing.

For the Lord our light and our love has turned the night into day.”