Adalia

Adalia will die. She will die of old age while I am still young, or I will watch her die tragically, or find her body in the woods or in the street. As a child, I watched my father die. My siblings grew up, married, left home. The only man I've really loved is gone. I will never see him again. My friends are gone, most off at school. Everyone leaves, or dies.

Adalia will die. By getting a dog I set everything in order to be heartbroken again. I will mourn her death some day down the road. I will remember the ordinary nights such as this when she wandered around the bedroom, pulling my sweater out of her kennel to tug at its corners, then chasing her tail furiously around in circles, and finally hopping up on my bed where she plops down in my lap making it very difficult to type. These are the nights I will cry over when she is gone.

I didn't need a dog. I got her to help me cope with a very traumatic event, important, but I only cried out for a puppy when I saw a rabbit outside my window and wished desperately that I had some small animal to clutch tightly, to love. I found Adalia. And I love her so very much.

Her fur is a golden shade of brown, with black accents around her ears, neck, and tail. The very tip of her tail is white; her paws and chest are white, and she has a crooked white stripe that runs from her nose up to her forehead. She's smart. Too smart for her own good. She looks at me when I talk as if she understands every word I'm saying, and also as though she doesn't give much of a damn. Unless I'm holding a sausage treat. But she is sweet. When I come home from work and let her off the outside leash or out from her kennel, she flies around mad, torpedoing into my body with enough force it almost knocks me over. After she calms down, I rub her backside and ears. She'll sit on the floor with her little paws spread out underneath her belly and let me hold her just as long as I like. And when she sleeps with me she sprawls out between my legs so that I can barely move during the night. It often wakes me up as I sometimes get uncomfortable. But I look down and she's just as happily asleep as can be.

In her stubbornness, Adalia has outraged me. When she was ill, I was never before more worried about anything. When she snuggles up to me on the bed, I cannot be more happy and at peace. I love her.

And yet I think. . .

When she dies, will I wish she were never mine? Will the heartache be too much to bear? She is my closest friend these days. She is often the only living thing who is with me. Sometimes I think she's all I have. But, she too will die. She too will leave me. And what will I do then. . .