Eve of a New Year

Dear WEb,
I need to write on this last night of 2010 because it is the last night of the worst year of my life and the last night of the last year my beloved was alive. Bittersweet. Another layer of letting go. It's been unexpected. But I can feel the thread connected to the year stretching stretching moving farther and farther away. It will never be 2010 again.

This morning I woke up remembering something from last winter. It was strange: something last year late fall, early winter struck me and I was fraught with the fear that Phoenix was ten years old and that he would die soon. I remember going to work that day and the days following in a fit about this, talking to a co-worker who deeply understands loss and the love of animals. I specifically remember being so troubled by this awareness of what I thought was his age--10 years old! And then I went to his vet records at some point and realized no, he's not 10--he's 9 years old! It changed everything. I relaxed and was relieved that he was not 10. I don't understand or remember why his being 10 meant anything much different than being 9, but it did then.

Now, I can look back and see the significance of that. He turned 10 on July 2nd. He was dead by that birthday. It's eerie to think about some part of me Knowing what was coming. And that's a double edged sword to think about that. You know the guilt that wants to ride the tail of that "knowing". If I Knew...why couldn't I stop it? Shouldn't I have stopped it?? Etc. Etc. But if I hold off the guilt, it's pretty WuWu to consider my panic about him being 10, because being 10 meant being dead.

So....the other layer of this is that he was killed in this year--2010. Perhaps that is some of it too. I pay attention to numbers--it' s a thing I've grown into doing. Not Numerology...as in the ancient and very detailed official system of meaning with numbers. But over the years, I've begun to pay attention to my own 'unofficial' system of meaning and numbers. And the number 10 is a 1 and a 0....which signifies to me a loss, one being left. Of course none of this was conscious a year ago. A year ago I was conscious of the panic that was happening around Phoenix being 10. I didn't know why except I thought it made him older and our time was nearer to the end than the beginning. This is all retrospect and attempts at making meaning.

All of this is part of my saying goodbye to 2010, a horrible and wonderous year.

Again, Phoenix, I love you so and miss you so and pray for more wonder in 2011--eleven is double ones: a much more comforting arrangement.
So much love in my heart for you,
Phoenixx