I took Red up on his hill again yesterday, the sky was so clear and blue, the pastures are slowly turning green.

He loves to sit and watch the sheep grazing, he is serious but not intense any more, he could once move the sheep 200 yards away with his eyes.  Now, he doesn’t really move them at all.

They don’t seem to pay much attention to him any more, he is nearly blind and partly deaf and can’t run too far and fast. Nobody reads a dog better than sheep read a border collie. I bet they knew his eyes were going long before me or the vet.

I love sitting with Red on that hill, I can tell he knows I am there, but he is still too professional to look away from the sheep I think he follows them by the sound of them eating and their baaahing to one another. Dogs can hear things we don’t even know exist.

I don’t know what Red thinks, I wonder what he feels. I think we both cherish this time together in our different ways, it feels like what it is supposed to feel like in our difference consciousness. We speak without words or sounds mostly.

I have friend who is a devout and loving Christian, his father is dying and says his father’s illness has made him doubt the existence of God. Why would God allow this  to happen,  he asks me? And  how would I possibly know.

I aid ask my friend if he really believes in God, why does he doubt his decisions about his father? Do you only believe in God when he does what we like him to do? What makes us think that God owes us (or our dogs?) immortality?

I am grateful for life, but I don’t want to be greedy about it, we all end.

I am not clear on this God business, so I don’t have to worry about this time-honored questions. And if there is a God, I am  not so arrogant as to think he is calling the shots in my daily.

I felt the presence of God when I was sitting out the hill with Red, I was thinking this is the circle of life, two aging creatures with less time ahead of us than behind us – a lot less time.

I did speak to him the other day. I said “maybe this will be where you are going for a while, pal, maybe this what heaven looks like for spirit dogs, maybe this is a preview of your next life. A clear blue sky, a green pasture, sheep out grazing to the horizon, a clear stream running down the hill, a big old barn with mounds of hay to rest on or sleep at night. Or maybe you won’t even need to sleep, you’ll just sit and watch the sheep until your body heals and you go back. Maybe our paths will cross one day..”

But the truth is, I don’t think our paths will cross. I don’t think Red believes that either. With spirit dogs, when they are done, they are free. They don’t come back, they find someone else to help.

I am not a believer in the Rainbow Bridge, Red and Fate and Lenore and Frieda don’t owe me eternal life and companionship. Red deserves more than that.

He has earned more than that.

I wonder what it will be like when Red is gone, I do hope he doesn’t suffer, I won’t permit that to happen, not for long. We are not equals, although I can’t always tell what the boundaries are between us. We each sometimes seem to be part of the same thing, dogs can be like that.

I don’t say to Red “let’s go out on the hill,” I just put my hat on and take some bottled water and  head for the door. He is often asleep, but when I do that, he hops to his feet and comes to the door and waits.

I talk softly out loud not to tell him where to go but so that he knows where I am, even if he can’t see me. He comes through the gate with me and goes straight to our hill without me,  the same spot every day with a commanding view of the farm and the road beyond.

A place where every gentle breeze finds you up there and gives you a gentle hug.

I am not much of a believer in the God thing, but I feel the presence of God when I sit out there with Red.

There is a magnificent beauty and rhythm to life and I sense that Red and I do share one thing. We respect life, we accept death. We are grateful for what we have, we don’t dwell in the past (or the future) but the present.

Red accepts most of everything.

These visits to the hill shape our lives and days together right now. I write all day, often drive to Albany for the refugee thing or a doctor’s appointment or our on an errand.I always come back   to sit out with Red on a hill.

Two or three times a week, I take Red to the Mansion, where he is his old self, tail-wagging, rushing to find the clusters of young women waiting to gush over him and drop to the ground to hug him. He loves women, especially blondes, and knows just how to charm them. He hasn’t lost a step with women.

And they love him. Red has more girlfriends than Brad Pitt.

It is very sweet and nourishing, and I think, healing. We are in no rush, but it feels like we are both getting ready.

Red will go when he is done, and it is my job to know when that is, because he can’t really tell me. I’m not doing that my -dog-will-tell-me-when-it’s time thing.  That’s my responsibility, I can’t pawn it off on a dog.

Sometimes, I think I do my grieving in advance, a bit at a time,  putting a bit aside each day for when I need some.

It’s going to rain tomorrow, more flooding. I might let Red sit out there anyway, if that’s what he wants.