6.20.17

Frosted Flakes

I don't eat Frosted Flakes... well not very often.

The sugar rush gives me an almost immediate headache.

The who-knows-what processed component of these delectable little golden flakes makes me retain water. Tomorrow my feet will be swollen... this detour from my regular "clean" diet will cost me.  I stare morosely into the half empty bowl (ok, ok, it is my second half empty bowl). I can hear Tony the Tiger say "Theeey’re great!"  I am pretty sure he isn't talking about the health and nutritional benefits of this soupy, saturated, sugary mess I am feeding myself.

But tonight I don't care.

Tonight I am trying to stuff the hole in my heart through my stomach. I don't think it's working but I'm not giving up yet.

Tomorrow the vet will come to the farm and we will gather around Maizy. We will love her and pet her and speak soothingly to her. Tomorrow he will inject her and she will pass away. Her lungs will empty and her heart will stop. I fill my bowl again as I play it out. I will cry. For the kids, for my husband, for Maizy and for me. I know it's for the best. She shouldn't suffer or be in pain anymore. It's the right thing to do. That's what I will tell my grandsons. I will say it over and over. I will say it until I believe it. I will try to sound wise and sage when I say “It’s time.”  But I'm selfish and I don't want to let her go. I will be screaming inside. I reach for more frosted flakes.

Who will lay in my garden and crush my flowers?

Who will let me know when the UPS truck arrives?

Who will make a beeline for the entryway steps and lay there for me to step over?

How will I carry groceries up the steps without having to step over her?

Who will ride in the ranger with Craig?

Who will scratch at the door relentlessly?

How will it ever seem like winter without her to stand at the door with her teeth chattering?

Who will jump up and down so high like a kangaroo? As I would sit in my car, waiting for the gas to fill the tank, she would jump up and down in front of it. Just her silly faced grin appearing and disappearing over the hood.

I add some more Flakes to the milk.

Why is there never an equal amount?

Life and cereal can be so damn unfair sometimes.

Her face is puffy with a cancerous lesion and she is missing some teeth. The surgeries and the antibiotics couldn't save her.  Yet, through it all, her tail wags and she ambles as quickly as she can to come in to eat. She has always loved dinnertime.

One of our earliest memories is of her, as a puppy, when we were adding onto this house. She made friends with all the workers. When they weren't watching she would snatch their lunch sacks and run behind the grain bins to enjoy her pillage.

She was a gift. Literally. I gave her to Craig the Christmas before we got married. She was our first child. Her passing will mark the end of a chapter.  She has been with us since my North Dakota story started. Hayden, the youngest child in our family is now 18 years old and over 6 feet tall was still in a carseat when we went to get her.

There is a picture of Alex, a curly headed 10^th grader sitting beside a giant John Deere tire with Maizy in his arms. He used to take her in the tractor with him. Craig would shake his head at this but Alex continued. She was his first tractor buddy.

She wasn’t much a whiner… unless we were roasting marshmallows.  We discovered that if your marshmallow fell off the stick there was no need to clean it up. Maizy would eat every single one.  Craig soon learned that she didn’t need them roasted. She wasn’t fussy like that.

I don't want her to go. I don't want to enjoy the beautiful summer morning walks without her. I don't want to race back to the house on cool autumn evenings without her. I don't want the other dogs here to be without her.  She comes to her name but she also comes when I call her Momma Dog. 

I don't want it to be over. My bowl is almost empty. I don't want her pain to continue. Tears leak from eyes and my nose runs. I can't see the individual flakes in my bowl anymore. Everything is blurry.

I don't know if I can do what I should do tomorrow but I know I cannot not do it. For her sake.

I drink the last of the syrupy milk from my bowl. It's empty and so is my heart. The cereal didn't work. I push the box away and wipe my eyes and my nose.

My husband comes home and we talk about our girl, our Maizy, our Momma Dog. His voice cracks and I look away. 

He reaches for the Frosted Flakes box and  slowly opens it. His cheeks are wet as absently eats the sugary sweet flakes.

RIP Maizy Mayhem