Grief is the price of love... August 29 2015, 1 Comment

It’s so hard to say goodbye…

Our little furry angel got her wings back. And we’re heartbroken. 

It’s amazing the amount of grief that we can feel for the loss of a non-human friend. Those of you who have loved an animal know exactly what I’m talking about. 

At the very beginning of our relationship, one of the first things Nate said to me about his little Linda was: “You know why she’s so heavy for such a small body? It’s because she’s made of only heart…” That’s when I started to fall in love with her. And him.

We buried her in our garden and marked the spot with a big heart. Just as we were finishing, a large beautiful orange butterfly landed next to us and hung there for a while, as though it were observing the scene. It was missing half a wing. It finally flew off, clumsily but still strong and made circles in our back yards before disappearing. Almost like it was saying to us “See, I can still fly!”

For those of you who don’t know, our little girl was missing a leg for about half her life… 

She made her transition yesterday, the day after our 10 year anniversary. One day we celebrate, and the next we grieve. But that’s life. The full spectrum of the human experience.

The deeper we love, the harder we grieve. And it's painful. But the only way to avoid it is to not love at all, and that's just not an option in my book...