The greatest gift I’d ever received
RIP, a dog that loved me unconditionally.
This year has started on a sad note. As I was getting ready for a bike ride on January 1st, I received a text from my sister, letting us know that our family dog, Charlie, was really sick. They took her to the emergency pet hospital.
“The vet says she’s suffering, and they don’t know what’s wrong, said we need to put her down.” She wrote. “They need to do it soon.”
As soon as I read those words, my heart dropped, and my eyes became waterfalls. A few minutes later, I went on FaceTime to say goodbye to the dog who has been in my life for the past 17 years. Even though she lived a long life—well longer any of us had anticipated—it felt so sudden, and it was hard to believe she reached the end of her life.
I spent most of the day looking through old photos of Charlie, wanting to remember all I’d done with her, all she had contributed to my life. I logged into Facebook for the first time in ages, scrolling past a hundred different versions of myself, all the way to my senior year of high school in search of some puppy photos.
I found pictures of Charlie in my backyard, sunbathing. I found pictures of her cuddling with my friends and playing with her toys. I found pictures of her on my bed, licking a yogurt container clean. I found pictures of her on hikes and bike rides with me. While my late teens and early twenties were some of the worst years of my life, I was reminded of the little moments of joy this little 5-pound fluffball brought me.
“What’s your favorite memory with Charlie?” my partner asked me.
We sat in silence for a while as I thought it over.
“I don’t know if it’s my favorite,” I said, “but it’s the one that stands out the most.”
I told her about when I was severely depressed as a college student and went home for winter break. Earlier that year, I found out the guy I was dating had gone on a roundtrip to hook up with his ex—I was devastated. I saw it as a personal failure, as if something I did or didn’t do was why he’d betrayed me. I was ashamed, so I didn’t tell my friends at school about it, and I suffered through the pain in isolation.
All those days that winter I spent crying in bed, Charlie was there cuddling up next to me. As tears streamed down my face, she licked them up. With her, I didn’t have to conceal my pain. She didn’t dismiss my feelings or judge me for being depressed. She didn’t avoid my suffering or abandon me. She sat with me, and each time her tongue grazed my cheeks, it was as if she was saying, “You aren’t alone.”
Maybe she just liked the taste of my salty tears, or maybe she could tell that I was in distress. Either way, when I felt like I had nobody else to turn to, Charlie comforted me. During my darkest moments, she showed me unconditional love—the greatest gift I’d ever received.
