Our beloved Mr Young

There’s a spirit burning brightly in the winter air beneath Julius’ tree in his grandparents’ garden in Röttenbach, Bavaria. Our beloved Mr Young lies there, a premature victim of the stress that our roving lives created for him. Julius has lost his brother and best friend, and we a loving member of our family.

The days are different now, there’s something missing, and that empty part in each of us still cracks wide open as we struggle to adjust to life without our loyal and trusting companion. At least once a day I still hear his bell, and just half-an-hour ago I heard his “hello” chirrup from some shadowy corner of the house. And as with each and every instance of these audible reminders, I turn in hope, only to realize that it’s my heart making echoes of our wishes.

As time goes on, all this will happen less frequently I suppose, until we remember and talk of him – both happily and sadly – with steadier voices and drier eyes.

In the end, I think all of our roving was just too much for him. The move from the US first to Germany, and Maria’s parents’ yappy poodle … then to the Italian countryside with its overpopulation of wild cats and world of strange and ominous things … then to our rental house with the 4 dogs across the street … our 5-day absence in the UK in early December … the mystery blight that leveled him and hospitalized him for 2 days … and the 10-hour car trip to Germany.

He knew that something was afoot, with all the packing of suitcases and trips to the car. He knew that we were going away again. And whether he was coming with us or staying on his own, somehow he knew it would be too much for him, still recovering from his undiagnosed brush with death. After returning from the vet hospital, every time we went out, he sat at the front door, waiting for us to return.

In his own way he tried to tell us, huddling silently and sadly under the trampoline as we searched for him, our last precious piece of cargo before hitting the road. We didn’t recognize his signal – or subliminally chose not to – and he died less than an hour after arriving in Germany. We simply shouldn’t have left. We shouldn’t have left.

In the end, I am left with a picture of him sitting, like a compact ball of woolly silk, in quiet submission to the will of his family, resigned to his fate. He trusted us. We let him down.

We’re so sorry, Mr Young, we’re so sorry.