Grieving

Last night, the first night without Sarah, I knew the hard part would come when I tried to sleep. "Mindfulness," I thought, knowing I needed to sleep and did not want to grieve anymore right then. "I am in a soft bed; the room is cool; the music is soothing; the covers are warm and I am sleepy." I realized I felt guilty for not thinking of Sarah. Am I not supposed to be sad?

But Sarah is now part of me, part of that oneness that makes up all beings. What is there to be sad about? I miss her bright eyes, her eagerness. But is it not there, forever in a picture in my mind? Nothing replaces her presence though, except when you see those same bright eyes peering out of a new rescue and you know you are being revisited.

"I commune with the Spirit in people and in all things," Ernest Holmes.

So still, though, as my realization leans more in that direction, Sarah and Conrad and all the rats before them and all the people I have loved and lost (Joella, Papa, Gandma, Bill, Freddie) are still here, usually unseen and untouchable, but still in communication, still part of me. (I felt Freddie's presence a week ago, while laughing with my son).

I'll take all the help I can get for I still believe in heaven, the Rainbow Bridge, anywhere that I believe I can see and touch all of these beings again. Somewhere this past year I heard that your own belief in the afterlife is what you will experience.

And Eckhart Tolle teaches that my primary purpose is to experience the moment I am in and that anything else will lead to suffering. So, thanks to that wisdom, last night I slept peacefully, without tears or anguish. Would anyone really accuse me that I should have stayed awake and felt bad if I really cared?