Violet Flower

“The violets in the mountains have broken the rocks.”
- Tennessee Williams

I have fond memories of violets.  My grandmother, who loves planting and caring for flowers every year, even in her 80’s, always had violets.  In the summer they were among the sea of colors in her flower beds.  In the cold Minnesota winter, she would tend to fuzzy leafed African violets inside her window sill.  As a big sister, and sometimes tyrant jokester, I would make special made up recipes while playing house with my sisters, making them try a bite of violets in order to play with the big kids. Those small blooms, peeking out from heart shaped leaves, were petite constants in my childhood.

Violets often bloom early in the spring, a sign of renewal, even though they have also been used for mourning.  The Romans saw them as flowers for resurrection.  The Greeks used violets for medicinal properties, especially respiratory issues, and as a natural pain relieving aspirin.  And in some ancient practices there are stories of violet leaf concoctions stopping cancer growth.  Violets have seen their way into hearts through many countries and are the state flower for several states.
It’s no wonder that, since the time of ancient civilizations and until today, the little violet flower has been the symbol of sweetness, humility, and delicate love.

Cancer doesn’t give you much notice.  It doesn’t discriminate.  It doesn’t give you adequate time to prepare.  And it keeps moving forward, even if you feel yourself being dragged along by it…either in disease or recovery it just keeps marching on.  But when we lost our Bella girl, time felt like it stopped.  Like everything else along our road, we have had to keep moving, not on or away from feelings of loss, but alongside them.  Grieving is different for everyone, but grieving on top of grieving is no picnic.

A few weeks ago, in my process of healing, I started looking at Chihuahua pictures online.  I would click through google images and both cry and smile.  We had talked about another pet some day. Eventually, maybe later in the year, Wil had given a thumb’s up to thinking about another dog because he knows my heart. And, as an added motivation, Tyson had not been himself since Bella’s death...the house a quiet stillness.  We have had no intention of looking for a puppy though.  Life is busy and puppies are fun, but require so much care.  The online pictures were just of therapeutic value to me. Nothing more, nothing less.   

I had looked at rescues too, disappointed to find that there would be judgments about Wil’s diagnosis and treatment.  That thought was too much for me to emotionally maneuver so I stopped thinking of adoption and felt a little tinge of dispair.  We knew when the time was right though, Tyson would need a female companion, hopefully smaller and younger than him.  For me, a house without a Chihuahua hasn’t felt much like home anymore.  Yet it has felt impossible to get the wants and needs met while Wil is still battling. 

I had thrown out the idea of getting another pup to some coworkers and friends, with mixed reviews.  There were two camps:  1.) “Your husband has cancer, isn’t life complicated enough?” and 2.) “Your husband has cancer, do whatever the hell you want!”    

It’s funny how the best things in my life have never come about on my time frame.  Thank you divine universe. 

It is with much happiness, with a full heart and joyful tears, that we announce the mountains of our journey have been blanketed in regrowth, from a random wonderful picture I would stumble onto--a little 2 year old, long hair Chihuahua girl.  With a complicated first pregnancy, making her of no value as a breeder (her original fate), a little furball appeared in our path. For her, a chance at a first ever indoor life, bedazzled collar, real toys, and most importantly—her first family.  For us, a chance at healing.  She is sweet, delicate, humble…and growing our hearts a little each day.  Tyson’s ears now perk.  He smiled the night he met her…the first time I saw his face truly happy since Bella died.  His heart now seems full too.

I’m not sure this new fuzzy friend will cure cancer like the medicines of the violet flower, but life somehow feels complete again in the midst of the chaos…like we are starting a new stage of renewal through giving love to our new girl, little Violet.

Much like the flower, I hope my documentation of our journey has shown the delicate beauty in life realities, even as we face deathly obstacles. Its why, despite our life being busy and complicated, we choose to keep living.  We choose to keep loving.  We choose to enjoy the small pleasures this life can hold while we can hold them in physical form.  We choose to laugh, to hold, to kiss, to give refuge.  Life could end tomorrow.  And in the light of that reality there was really only one choice once we met Violet, a sad little creature without the safety of true love—it was to hold on to the notion that the cancer will never be bigger than the dreams we share as a family.  

Welcome little flower…we love you already and you have already broken through some of the pain.  We feel like Bella sent you to us.  We miss her still, but can see a future in you now too.  This day has a new sweet fragrance.   

Deep breath in.  Onward.

Lean

Jenny here. 

I am sorry to be absent for awhile. If you are a dog enthusiast you know how difficult it can be to lose a little one. I may be overly attached to mine...I guess it's all how you look at it. Regardless, Bella's tragic, and not in my time frame, passing just came at what felt like the worst time. 

I hope people know I am mostly optimistic by nature.  But the stress and ups and downs that is my dear hubby's treatment, keep me dangerously close to the floor most days. I just had no idea that this floor had a basement and I would fall through to it.  

Our sweet Tyson dog was a mess the first few days.  Accidents (which never happen for him), whimpering in his sleep, deep soulful breaths into her blanket.  In some ways he is saving me again from deep despair.  My crying makes him so worried.  And so we play extra long, hug extra tight. He now has a makeshift bed next to ours and is keeping the boundary because he enjoys being close, even if it's not in our bed.  The house is quiet without his sergeant to give bark orders. 

I have now been the crazy lady breaking down in the pet store while buying dog food, strangers gathering around to hug me. I'm now that spectacle in the Sonic parking lot, sharing a corn dog, bite by bite, with my puppy who was left behind. I am the one nearly collapsing from the weight of tears when I come in the door at night and it hits me again that she is gone or I automatically reach for her when waking up.  I am the one trying to figure out how to feel all the feelings: love, grief, betrayal, fear, hope...and actually be ok with them and the time it takes to deal with them.

Bella always knew how to lean into emotions.  Never shy away.  A friend said to me this week, she was a furry social worker.  Truer words I cannot find for her.  My niece said she wasn't just an ordinary dog.  Silly me had somehow thought of her as my back up plan.  It's morbid, but she had a greater statistical chance of living the next five years than Wil. I thought she would be there the next five no matter what happened.  What I carry with me is her spirit:  love without abandon, friendly spunk, ask for what you need, and stay with whatever you feel until it transforms.

UTSW, in all their wonderful ness, once again wrapped their literal arms around us.  I had more prayers and hugs last weekend than I knew what to do with.  The nurses and even the weekend attending oncologist, cried with us and loved us and took care of more than just Wil's physical needs. 

I think Tyson saw her one night.  He visually traced something moving slowly across the room. He didn't bark.  He was at rest but alert. 

This blog is really not just about Bella.  It's really about the deep sorrow that comes from losing a joy.  It is about the journey we now make from the basement back to higher ground.  Life is so short. You don't get over loss, but if the life within you is strong, you manage to move through it somehow.  I don't think this hole gets filled in.  Just like the holes left from the sorrow we've gone through the last six months. You can't be the same as you were before.  You just grow around the places left open. 

Wil is doing well.  Tired.  Counts have recovered well.  He is getting a weekend, 11th day of the cycle, chemo as I write. We have enjoyed a few days with his old roomie from college who was a surprise to him all the way from Wisconsin. One foot in front the other. There are some days, that in and of itself, is truly the miracle.  

Love Sorrow by Mary Oliver

"Love sorrow. She is yours now, and you must
take care of what has been
given. Brush her hair, help her
into her little coat, hold her hand,
especially when crossing a street. For, think,

what if you should lose her? Then you would be
sorrow yourself; her drawn face, her sleeplessness
would be yours. Take care, touch
her forehead that she feel herself not so

utterly alone. And smile, that she does not
altogether forget the world before the lesson.
Have patience in abundance. And do not
ever lie or ever leave her even for a moment

by herself, which is to say, possibly, again,
abandoned. She is strange, mute, difficult,
sometimes unmanageable but, remember, she is a child.
And amazing things can happen. And you may see,

as the two of you go
walking together in the morning light, how
little by little she relaxes; she looks about her;
she begins to grow.”