A Farewell Re-Visited ...

lansinfield3
Originally uploaded by playzwifstonz
It is the nature of grace always to fill spaces that have been empty.
~ Goethe

The regal canine depicted above in her dogdom of wildflowers is Lansbury -- the first dog my ex and I acquired in our partnership. This photo was taken just 4 months before I would part from the two of them, taking our other dog, Iman, with me.

Two years ago, it appeared that Lansbury was on her last legs and I went to say a very tearful goodbye. The stubborn old girl, much like her other mother, has sunk her fangs into life up until just recently. I received a similar call this morning from my ex, only this time with a much more serious assessment and an emphasis on the fact that Lansbury's decline would likely be resulting in her being put down in the coming week or so. Sitting with the rightness of whether to make another farewell visit or not, the answer from within was a resounding yes that I should and I went directly over.

It was a healing time all the way around during this interaction at my former residence -- the house which my ex inherited from her parents after we buried them a month apart just 8 years ago. As I gently stroked the now quite fraile Lansbury, only 7 lbs and partially blind and deaf, my ex and I spoke about the many losses that have happened for her (and me too) over these past several years. After her parents, it was a co-worker and mutual friend of ours -- same cancer as her father died of. And then I left. She partnered with another woman for 2 years and then lost her to ovarian cancer -- just this past March, 1 month after her brother died. And now, we laid on the floor tenderly surrounding the next loved one to leave.

The magnitude of sadness and loss that was present today was larger than all of us and yet, it was for me both personal and impersonal. My heart was touched directly at certain moments and then I would experience "threads" of sadness/loss that permeated the atmosphere -- both vivid and alive in their dance around the room. This for sure is the by-product of my healing work and the non-dual practice of impersonal movement. I felt a great deal of compassion and open-heartedness for my ex, for Lansbury, for myself and all those who have gone before us.

Walking out the front door of my ex's today, civilly and without regret or anger or resentment, was wonderful to experience. It was such an honest visit, minus the historical baggage and willfull intent to take jabs at one another. And, this is also the truth: I have no desire to be in my ex's life. There is no emotion attached to that -- it really is just what it is. I feel space around my heart saying that out loud.

In my prayers over these next few days, I will ask God -- if it is in his will, to help Lansbury cross over as peacefully as possible. Not just for the little pooch's sake, but more so for the serenity of her other mother.