A Letter To My Heavenly Father

by Lucky Garvin

ABBA,

I know it makes no sense to write to You who already knows what I think and feel  better than I do; but ever on fool’s missions, I’ll proceed.

A dear friend called me the other day about the column I wrote about Rock. He said, “You sure know how to make a grown man cry.”  I said, “So did Rock;” more in the last ten days than in the last twenty years.  But grieving and loving are emotions set opposite on the same continuum; so despite my loss, I want to thank You for putting him in my path. The odds that Rock should have ended up in our home are astronomical; I see Your hand at play in this ‘co-incidence.’ I know full well Rock did not come to me by accident.

In our writing, we employ a humble ideograph we call the ‘dash’ or hyphen.  Although it has several employments, its most formidable usage is when it’s intended to embrace a lifetime, i.e. on a tombstone, Joe Blow Born 1900 – Died 1975. The average human lifetime is but 27,700 days, and this humble mark embodies every deed we ever accomplished, or failed to, everyone we loved or hated; within its fragile borders, a lifetime is condensed.

My ‘dash’ will be full of love, most recently Rock. I’ve known people who feel we love humans more than we can love animals. I have recently come to believe that love is love; an attachment to a love-object is no different be it two-legged, four-legged, feathered, finned or furred. Some call their animals ‘pets’; some call them ‘family.’ [That’s something Rock taught me.]  Rock’s dash will say, I loved him; that’s not especially noteworthy, I guess … but that he loved me … that is; that is most noteworthy.

Another thing he seemed concerned about was my sense that I have lived the life of a fraud. Many years ago I took a Myers-Briggs personality inventory. Once complete, their analysis of me was, “No one will love you more, and forget you sooner…”  The test seemed to have nailed my true nature; in other words, a man with a good bedside manner who was faking it. Refuting those scholars eloquently were  my tears.  Phonies don’t shed the tears of loss I have over my boy. He is not now, nor will he ever be forgotten. Another of his gifts revealed. Without a degree, and never a word spoken, he saw right through my bluff … and up-ended  that faulty analysis.

So I’m happy he’s up there with you, but, do I still miss him? Only when I breath out and breath in; the rest of the time’s not so bad. I know grieving takes precisely as long as it takes, not one moment longer, not one moment less. The rules for grief are: there are no rules for grief. It took my Rock three years to find his true home.  I hope we made it worth the wait. Will we get another dog? Yes, not as a replacement [no one could replace my boy], but because there’s another ‘Rock’ out there languishing in some anonymous cage, waiting to find loving owners;  to refuse another ‘rescue’ would be a poor tribute to Rock’s memory; his was not a narrow, jealous spirit. I know Rock would not mind if I miss him, but because he loved me, he would not want me to over-grieve, nor deprive another animal of a warm  home.  So, God, set in my path some broken dog or cat, maybe sick, three-legged, old or one with a marled eye, some critter no one wants, who is fed, not carelessly, but hopelessly by some shelter volunteer; a forgotten one who spends endless days in a cage waiting for an owner who will never come; an animal who never looks up at someone’s approach; why bother? Tomorrow will be the same as today; the same as a thousand yesterdays. It’s no trick to get adopted when you’re young, cute, healthy, and able to bewitch your potential new owners with helpless, doleful  eyes. No, Sir, put into our path an orphan with no hope; and if the rest of his life be measured in mere months, my Sabrina and I will see to it that his days are filled with all the joy and affection previously denied him. We have found  oft-times, the ‘rescuer’ is the one rescued, as with our Rock.

Also, I won’t forget the lesson Rock taught me about loving. But, the etchings of childhood are far easier to cover than to erase; merely covered or ignored, they continue to exert a toxic influence.  So I say to you, ABBA, that although there will always be something of the ‘trader’ in me, I am grateful You sent me a vision of how normal people love, and give me something to strive for.

I went to the mailbox yesterday and found an invoice. I looked at the return address; it simply said,

ROCK

HEAVEN

Reading down the bill I saw the following entries for which I was being charged:

For being your constant companion

For 24 hour a day protection

For waiting up until you came home

For searching the house that night when Sabrina and I heard a noise we shouldn’t have

For loving you

For my loyalty to you

For my warning you of each car coming up the driveway

Beneath that were the credits:

You loved me

At the bottom, a stamp read, “PAID IN FULL.”

I ask you this in prayer, ABBA: since I can no longer do so, please look after my boy.

Me