Rest

For Photo Friday.

Before Rocky went for his surgery, I lapsed into this crazy photographer phase and took photos of him wherever he went. No matter how much I tried to tell myself that he was going to be okay, I always worried that little bit more that he wasn't going to be. I even shot a couple of videos, because the pictures just didn't seem like enough.

This was taken late one night, less than a week before that fateful Thursday. I watched him sleep, as I have so many times all these years, and wondered how it was that watching someone's chest heave from their breathing could make me smile that widely.

I now realise that no matter how hard I try, I'll never be able to capture all of him -- his musky smell, the way he stretches when he wakes up, the sound of him sniffing in the nooks and crannies, the wetness of his tongue against my cheek.

(That's how it is with blogs too, I guess; words on a page that will never replace the human touch, the soft whispers, the warm hugs, the tears falling on your shoulder -- no matter how hard we try.)

***

My head hurt, and I felt like throwing up.

Things'd been going so well that I'd just assumed... I'd totally forgotten about the test results.

The voice over the phone hit me like a ton of bricks.

Cancer. Chemotherapy. Diarrhoea. Vomitting. I heard only snippets.

He hates going to the vet. Every visit means only one thing to him: pain. But every time he comes home, he's so happy to be running around, wagging his tail, splashing in water; he forgets it all so quickly. And perhaps that's just what might save his life.

He won't understand -- and that hurts me more than anything else -- but it's his only chance.

Chemotherapy -- such a huge word for such a small dog.