Controlling Our Patch of the Universe

Last night, neighbors started setting off fireworks. My immediate impulse? Close all the windows and blinds so the pooch doesn’t fret.

And then it hit me, as apparently it’s going to do over and over again: The pooch is no longer here.

My reactions to her death are normal, I know. Initially, I was overwhelmed with guilt that I didn’t do more for her, or understand her better, or prevent the final outcome. In my head, I reviewed every doctor’s appointment, every bout of illness, every decision about the pooch’s healthcare.

But then I stumbled upon “Second Opinion: A Vet’s Perspective,” Nick Trout’s column in the April/May issue of Bark magazine. He’s the author of Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing, and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon, and in this column he presents a case study of how health problems can go undetected and subsequently flare rapidly into irreversible, inoperable, fatal outcomes—devastating to both guardians and vets.

This mirrored my pooch’s experience. No typical symptoms of the evil lurking in her body. No clues to point the vet in one direction or another. I felt a little better. And then I read this basic truth on Patricia McConnell’s The Other End of the Leash:

“We are not in control of the world. Stuff happens. Bad stuff. … Good people die when they shouldn’t. Gorgeous dogs brimming with health, except for that tumor or those crappy kidneys, die long before their time. … It’s not fair, it’s not right, and it hurts like hell. But please please, if you’ve moved heaven and earth to save a dog and haven’t been able to… just remember: Stuff happens. … You didn’t fail. You tried as hard as you could. It’s okay.”

Hmmm. If a preeminent veterinary surgeon and a renowned animal behaviorist can’t control the inevitable, what makes me think I can? Well, I didn’t really think I could; I only wanted to.

But that’s the point, isn’t it? That’s the basic truth we must all come to grips with in our lives. We can’t. And it’s destructive to even want to. We have to accept that there will always be some elements of our lives that are beyond our control.

Early this morning, around 3 o’clock, the shrill, incessant peeps of hungry baby birds woke me. Instant headache. And this thought: Ah! Nature’s cycle. One beloved animal wrested from me just as another proclaims its existence.

The cycle is bigger than us—beyond our range of control. Sometimes we have to honor Nature by deferring to it.