Learning to let go

We said goodbye to Cajun on Sunday morning. He was shrouded in clean white sheets, and looked peaceful, but his body was cold. I kissed him goodbye, and the smell of death was all that I could smell. It blurred my vision.

It so strange that we attach so much significance to the corporeal form, even when the spirit which has made it what it was has fled, leaving it a mere shell of what was loved. Still, it is so hard to let go of. Maybe because it is the only reminder of what we have left.

I had been dreading the cremation all of Saturday night, but when the time came to say goodbye, it didn’t hurt as much as I was expecting. Partly it was because seeing him lying there made it clear that he was gone, and there was some sense of closure. Partly, it was the feeling that it was simply his time, and all we could do was say goodbye, let him go, and send him on his way.

I am grateful to the technician who handled it. He laid him out, then stepped away to let us say goodbye. And when he moved his body into the cremation oven, he handled him gently. And when he covered him with the shroud, and closed the door, he waited for us to say okay, to let it proceed at the pace we could handle.

It’s the little things.

I was going to write about Cajun, and what made him ours. But I found that I couldn't. Not yet, anyway. So all I will say is this. He was special to us, and he will, like Zeph, be missed every day.

Sleep well baby.