Annie
1988? - 2006

My Annie Banannie - click there for her story. Below is the end to her story.

It’s 1 am, and I’m whipping thru games of spider solitaire on my computer. Dogs around me, looking up every once in a while to see if I’m moving towards the bedroom. When I make no move, they sigh and plop heads back down on the carpet. I’m too busy muttering to myself, “just until I get a row of suit completed, then I’ll stop". In maniac mode, fingers just keep hitting keys. Over and over. Deal. Deal. Deal. Yes, start new game.

I don’t want to go to bed. If I go to bed, I’ll slow down. When I slow down the hurt comes. With aches so deep they flash across your chest and jump into your throat and burst from your eyes.

I write about the dogs I’ve lost because it helps me to let go, to say goodbye. But I don’t want to say goodbye to Annie. She’s the last. The last of my Greyhound Gang that I started in 1995. With her leaving, I no longer have a Gang. I have no loves in my life. I wander from room to room, seeing all the stuff that needs doing, and my inability to get a grip and just clean up the desk and keep raising funds to rescue hounds. I just don’t want to organize one more interminable auction.

Without my AnnieBananie, I have no one to tell me that it’s time to be in the kitchen getting food ready for her. I have no one to tell me it’s time to go for our walk so she can do her Annie Super-Girl routine. I have no one to tell me I am loved.

I was told by a communicator that in the big beyond, she’s not happy. She’s trying to boss everyone around, and that just doesn’t work over there. Where ever over there is. How does life go on? My aunt lays dying and no one will tell her. My dad is 82 and alternately fights and waits to die. I’ve dug so many graves and shed so many tears. Over the ones I’ve loved, and the ones that have never even had a chance at love. Some days it just hurts too much.

Stop bossing everyone around my little Monster Mash, and come back to me.

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