The Rainbow Bridge

It's been one year today that I lost my friend Duchess.

I remember like it was yesterday; how I couldn't bare going into her house because I knew she was ill. I'd stand on her back porch not daring to enter no matter how the tasty and familiar aromas reached out like tendrils from the backdoor and tempted my nose and stomach; the promise of food could sate my ready belly but the heart break I new would one day befall us all is what would fill me. It is a secret she and I held alone, a secret I longed to share and it was at those moments the chasm between Mom and me was the greatest; I needing so to tell Mom but having no human words, I remained silent.

Mom would grumble at my refusal to enter, grab me up wholesale and bring me into the light and warmth of the house. I would go to Duchess sniff her ears; ears that still moved like radars tuning into all of her surroundings enabling her to process her world via her heart and express it through the folds of skin appearing around her eyes as she smiled up at me, eyes I would kiss. I needed to go be with Mom, to mend my breaking heart, pull together it's unravelling strings that threatened to leave my heart and me in pieces.

On march 29th 2008 Duchess left us for the Rainbow Bridge, she's okay, waiting on the Rainbow Bridge to be reunited with her family and friends.

It took me more time to be able to reenter her house after she was gone. The loss of a great friend is a great loss indeed. There is a place in the house that holds her picture, at my height so I can see it when I need to. Sometimes there are biscuits shaped like bones or hearts left near her picture.
It's okay to eat them.