...wonderful tonight

And you know you're all grown up when your parent becomes your peer...

Riverboat themed party, in Southern California, 1995ish -

but I didn't dress in costume like everyone else did.

I wore a pencil skirt, white

and a colorful blouse, not riverboaty one bit, but definitely all grown up.

And my date was my father.

She, whom the party was held for, a coworker of his

a forty year old coworker, when forty seemed all grown up, which today, to me, it does not...

There were all forms of gambling going on that night, with irresistible, pretend paper money and over exaggerated glee, and I knew when I walked in that night that I'd be the big winner of the entire event and I was, but knowing so beforehand, understanding this in my gut didn't  actually make winning the big pot any less wonderful.

Weekend in Vegas for two, all included, all mine...

I separated myself from my Dad that night, often and appropriately, so he could mingle and I could be grown up single

I was suddenly and awkwardly closer in age to my parent then I'd known possible.

We were friends.

Since that time we've been many things, 

father/daughter being the most clear but not always the most easy of our relationship status

friends

relatives

peers

teammates

companions

champions 

opponents

and many hard to explain couplings

We are one of those car chargers that accepts most common receptacles for reenergizing.

We are good together.

All good.

Today, hour after hour, I never felt bored or wanted anything about our mutual suffrage or our shared hardship to end. Not ever.

I loved the toughness, but only wished it was my turn for the hard parts and not his.

I loved the bloom the two pints of red provided his precious cheeks

Today we were parent and child again, but this time I was the parent and he the child

I don't know how to be in this relationship all the time

I only know that the love I feel is outgrowing the hothouse it grows in.

He the Gardner, I the soil and the seeds are the million things between us.

I love my father.

And there were moments in our day, this day,  that I swore he'd never appeared more handsome

People used to tell me he looked like a movie star***

And tonight, he looked wonderful.... if wonderful means; I love your face and your eyes, your sighs and the feel of your cool hand in mine.

I love you daddy is not enough to say I love you daddy.

You looked wonderful tonight.

She loves me...

And into each life a little rain must fall...

though lately it seems to be falling like a river

strong, steady, constantly flowing

News, bad news, doesn't always travel fast.  

I took more then a day to tell my folks and most of my friends that my beloved pup Daisy is gone

It is the sad end of the longest and most successful relationship I've ever had.

Day in, day out

she was more often then not, wherever I was

the beach, the car, the mountains, the bed, the park, the bathroom floor,  the couch and even just the other day right there in the horse stable with me, happy and absolutely unintimidated.  

She's been smack dab in the middle of my life

for the past sixteen and a half interesting years

tail forever wagging

Spirited, intuitive, smart as a whip

sweet, kinda smelly, loyal, devoted, brave little bitch and I mean that with all the love in my heart.

Never more brave then when I brought home a hundred pound rescue who tried all our patience and whom would not exist today if not for the better half of him, if not for my Daisy.

He waltzed into our house and into our quiet life and dropped his big dog chocolate into her smooth peanut butter existence and sort of just like that, they harmonized and coexisted peacefully for the most part and when not peacefully, humorously for sure.

They were the oddest, odd couple.  

She alfa, all 16 pounds of her and he knew it.

She was the love of his life and she was certainly one of the great loves of mine.

Witness to my entire marriage, birth of my two kids, my long and winding divorce, our relocation and all the rest of it...

We people who have dogs blessing our lives may never ever realize how exposed, open and real we are with another living, breathing being, until that being is no more.

No one knows me like she did

no one knows how bad I am

not how good

not how tired

not how happy

 how lazy

how hyper

how funny

how retarded

how brilliant

how lonely

how blessed

how anything I was, am, might someday be -

because she saw all of me, really and truly, the me who is me

and she loved me anyhow ...

I know she loved me.

I know she loved me because every time she saw me, her adorable daisy of a tail wagged...

I held her wrapped in my arms, close to my heart, as she left me yesterday morning.

It was one of the most precious moments in a life of precious moments.

It was an honor to hold and kiss her as she disappeared.

Today, I'm profoundly aware of her absence and I'm afraid only slightly aware of my loss.

When I hiked my big dog today hoping to exhaust him so that he might not need the valium and prozac the Vet prescribed for my oversized, overly distraught Daisy lover, every few moments I looked for her.  

 Up in the tall green grass,  walking way up high, under the blue sky, with the breeze blowing my hair across my eyes, my heart pumping warm blood from my head to my toes, the air full of moist earth and wild flowers - over and over, I looked for her.  Over and over, I was painfully reminded that she wasn't with me anymore.

She wasn't in the tall grass rolling in some dead bunny 

she wasn't eating a decaying Cliff Bar discarded haphazardly by some careless hiker

she wasn't being scarfed down by a bandit coyote just off behind the scrub brush

She was just not there -

and I wanted her to be

Are we ever ready to say goodbye to one who never hurts us?

who loves us unconditionally?

who trusts us?

who forgives us?

who has no preconceived expectations of us?

Into each life a little rain must fall

 and into mine a little Daisy...