I think we did right by Red in bringing him home to the farm to rest. He is flying under the stars now, right with the angels,  where he belongs.

“He was mastered by the sheer surging of life, the tidal wave of being, the perfect joy of each separate muscle, joint and sinew in that it was everything that was not death…expressing itself in movement, flying exultantly, under the stars. “— Jack London, Call Of The Wild.

I read this passage to Red this morning, standing over his grave. The Call Of The Wild is my favorite book about dogs. I will read to him as often as I can.

At first, I liked the idea of Red’s ashes somewhere in my office, then Maria and I talked about it, and we both felt it would be right if Red could be buried here on the farm, near the sheep and the place he and I sat together these last few months.

And near me.

Maria dug this grave yesterday, as soon as we knew he was doing to die that afternoon.

When we came back from the vet with Red’s body wrapped in a blanket, we said a few words,  and we placed him in the grave and we both shoved dirt into the grave and covered him up.

We sat with one another all afternoon, we finally went out in the evening, looking for some ice cream. Then we fell asleep in each other’s arms, a sacred place for me.

I didn’t say any final goodbyes to Red,  his body is gone, but his spirit lives in me and many other people:  in the farmhouse and with the sheep, at the Mansion and Bishop Maginn High School.

Spirit dogs don’t ever really die, they just take different forms and live different lives. They move on, they do not exist for any one human being, it is selfish to think a dog like Red belonged just to me.

Then, after we filled in the dirt,  we put all of the rocks Maria dug up over the grave to keep any predators or scavengers away.

This was the right decision, to keep Red with us here, where he did so much of the work that he loved. I will picture Red doing his beautiful outruns around the fence below.

I think Red will be happy in this beautiful spot, he and I will get to talk every morning and he can still keep an eye on the sheep, who are usually just a few feet away. He can keep an eye on me, which was a seminal mission in his life.

This morning, when I stood up to get out of bed, something seemed eerily wrong to me. It was the first time I ever stood on the floor out of bed that Red was not lying there, waiting for me to get up. It opened a deep vein of sadness for me.

Every minute I have ever been sick in that house, and every second after my open heart surgery, Red was by my side, hour after hour. He always knew when I was in pain. He was always watching my back.

I think it’s the small things. Life will go on, for sure, but as my friend Eve Marko wrote to me this morning, loss is loss.

Life has given me a perspective on loss.

I  see the news, I think of the two babies we lost years ago, I think of the stories the refugee children tell me of their suffering and loss. I think of the people in Dayton and El Paso and a hundred other places.

There is a lot of pain in the world, I won’t take more than my share. Red was not about pain.

I won’t run or deny or hide from my sadness, but I will move forward with my life as soon as I can. All of us know loss and sadness, it is such an integral part of life.

I am always mindful of that.

I don’t want to do Red the disservice of grieving for his loss too long, I want to do him the honor of celebrating his life, which so many people are now helping me to do.

In this resting spot, Red can also get to be in the shade of our beautiful old apple tree,  he loved to lie under there when he watched over things in his pasture. In the harshest winter storms, Red lay out in the snow right there, unblinking and unwavering, even as he was covered in snow.

From there, he could keep an eye on things. Red was incorruptible. Nothing by my command could distract him. Rest, good boy, I told him, this morning, rest a bit. You did a lot of good.

Red was all about duty, he never failed me, he never failed anyone. I won’t fail him.

There were many different parts to Red, and he did all of them beautifully with conviction: Red the companion; Red the working dog; Red the therapy dog; Red the healer and friend and inspiration to many, many people.

In the end, he and I were not two things, but the same thing.  There was no longer any space between us. Red and I gave up words a long time ago, we just knew what each other wanted.

I  don’t believe Red will ever leave me, even as he moves on to do his work elsewhere.

As Jack London wrote of his dog Buck, there is an ecstasy that marks the summit of life, and beyond which life cannot rise. Such is the paradox of being alive, this ecstasy comes when one is most alive.

When I think of Red, and I will always think of Red, I think that love, genuine passionate love, was his, from the first and beyond our incomplete human vision of time.

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I want to thank so many of you for honoring Red and his life by sending money to help the teachers and students of Bishop Maginn High School. In Red’s honor, we will soon be able to buy Ipads for each of the faculty of the school, to help them teach.

I am humbled by this and touched, an angel named Sue started it by sending $4,000 for the Ipads and it went on from there.

Any overage I receive will go to help the refugee and other vulnerable children of the school – to help shore up the school’s security and to purchase needed clothes and shoes for the winter. At this school, the need is great, for teachers, for students.

In Red’s honor – his mission was always to do good – I will keep this impulse going as long as people wish to honor him in this way. We can use all the help we can get, and people thank me for giving them this chance.

I so love the idea of Red doing this good in death, as he did in life.

You can honor Red and his life and death if you wish by sending a contribution via Paypal, [email protected] or by check, Jon Katz, Honoring Red, P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 1286. That’s Red really, doing good beyond the boundaries of his life, his ecstasy of life. Thank you for giving such meaning to his life, and marking his death in so beautiful a way.