“I always loved your books but had to quit reading because the dogs always died. Please don’t let Zinnia die for a long time.” – Melinda.

I felt sad for Melinda when I read her note. Hiding from death never works out. I had this feeling that perhaps she was missing the point of life and the meaning of loving a dog. Who besides God could make such a promise?

I learned some time ago that I can’t deny death, or run from it. We can accept it, even embrace it if we choose. We can’t escape it. To me, life is constructed of beginnings and ends. If we can’t accept one, we can never understand the other. Our culture denies death to the very end and then hides the dying from sight. We hide the people who die from sight and are then stunned to come face to face with death.

When I went outside this morning, I saw that my lovely Zinnia garden is beginning to die as the nights get colder and we edge towards Fall. The smaller plants are already dying; the Zinnia’s are thinning out. In a week or so, they will all die.

I don’t want a dog that will never die, and I don’t want a garden that lives forever. Sometimes, the things most precious to me are the things that are gone, not the things that remain. I should hate to live forever; the very meaning of life would be lost to me.

When Red got sick, he and I shared some of the most beautiful moments of our lives, I brought him out to the pasture every morning to sit with me and with the sheep. Even though he could barely stand, he loved this time out in the field. I sat next to him and stroked his fur. I would not have traded this time for anything.

He died with his head in my lap. When little Gus was sick and dying, he sat in Maria’s lap every morning, sleeping peacefully while she sang to him. It is such a sad thing to lose a puppy, such a beautiful thing to hear that song. This is what it means to love a dog.

When one of my dogs dies, I appreciate them fully and deeply.  I feel the richness of missing something I loved, a feeling only human beings are believed to feel.  I think the joy of getting another. A garden is different for me, but there are some of the same feelings.

My garden allowed me to bring fresh flowers into our house and my office, and Maria’s studio all summer.

I will appreciate these flowers in a unique way when they are gone. Gardens die well, we can learn a lot from them.  Would it be the same if they were always here, and there was no reason to celebrate or rejoice when they came inside to brighten our lives? What would Spring mean then?

I think we often appreciate the things we have lost uniquely. As I see my Zinnia seeds sprout, flower, and enrich my days and brighten our home, I feel incredibly grateful for them when they die. I look forward to them in the Spring.

When my dogs die, it is a deep and lasting spiritual gift. I don’t mourn them much, I celebrate them and what they meant to me.   And I remember what a little girl told me when her chicken died: “I’m sad, Mommy, but now I will get to love another chicken, and that is a nice thing.”

I’m with her. When my dogs die, I give thanks for all the beautiful times we had, and I am beginning to think about how best to do it again. I would rather love a dog than mourn a dog.

For me, how bland to always have a garden, to have a dog that lives forever. I don’t wish to live forever; why should I expect a dog to live an eternal life? If dogs lived forever, I would never know Zinnia, or Rose or Red. Neither would Melida.

I would never experience the richness and meaning of loss, the joy and wonder of rebirth and redemption. When Zinnia dies, I also think how lucky I am to be able to get another one, a different one, to continue our journey together bear through life.

I’m sorry, Melinda, that you can’t bear to read a book that has a dying dog. They are the best books about dogs; they capture the power and wonder of loving them. Just think of  Of Call Of The Wild or Travels With Charley or Old Yeller or The Art Of Racing In The Rain or Marley and Me.

These are not books to run from, they capture the love and meaning of the human-animal bond.

Melinda, I can’t promise you that Zinnia won’t die any day now. She might get hit by a car, or die of cancer, or choke on a twig. Losing dogs is as much a part of loving them as getting a puppy. It teaches me what it means to love a dog or to live without one.

I can’t promise you that Zinnia won’t die, Melinda; I can only promise you that she will die, and so will you and I.

I promise you that her love will live beyond her and that the most beautiful thing about dogs and gardens is that we can go and do it again.