Struggling With Puggy's Loss

This week had been nothing but an uphill struggle. I received the news on Sunday evening. I hardly slept that night, resulting in my previous post at 4 am in the morning. At 5 am, I texted my colleague who lives halfway between me & our workplace, if it was possible that I carpool with her. It takes me an hour to drive to work & she's 30 mins from me. I thought I could hold it together but when we got to work & the usual "How's your weekend?" greetings came, I simply burst into tears. Between sobs, I recounted the story. Even the surgeon came to give me a hug. It was a long day, with us finishing at 6 pm. I didn't eat. I didn't feel like it at all. My eyes felt like sandpaper from all that crying. I finally got home at 7 pm that day.

I was exhausted, sleepy mostly. But despite being so tired, I found myself unable to sleep again. I repeated this routine, arriving home after 7 pm everyday. Hubs tried. He kept asking me how can he make me happy. He brought me out to dinner. He gave me massages every night coz my body was just aching terribly for no apparent reason. At work, I talked, I chatted, I laughed. I still feel the loss. I just didn't show it. I didn't want my colleagues to feel sorry for me.

It's a curse every pet owner must go through. The pain will dull with the passage of time. In the meantime, I just have to sit it through. Everyday, I pray for his soul. I wrote a eulogy for him 2 days ago when FB shared a picture of Puggy that I posted 6 years ago. I spoke from the depths of my soul & I hope wherever he is, he'll receive my message.

6 years ago today. 6 years later today you're gone. If you had only waited just a bit longer, you would be savouring the life we have in stored for you. You're so similar in character to Basil that I'm sure you guys would be the perfect partners in crime, stealing food you know you shouldn't have. I can just imagine you cuddling up with Basil on the doona on cold winter nights.

You were still young, we thought we had time. But you were so suddenly & so unexpectedly taken from us. I chanted for every dog that I know who passed. Everyone of them came to say goodbye. Even DX who detested me came to say goodbye. But I couldn't see you. I couldn't even feel you. Where have you gone? I don't want to hold you back from your next destination. I'm sure a beautiful life awaits you. I have to learn to let you go. You will always be my naughty 2nd son, the one who ate the dining chair. I love you, my boy. Till we meet again.

Puggy's Gone

I can't sleep. I'm consumed by sorrow, anger & most of all, guilt. 11th December. 1 year ago on this day, we brought Basil home to live with us. It started off with an intention to celebrate his 1 year anniversary with us. Nothing out of ordinary. Woke up, watched a movie on Netflix. Hubs had to help a friend collect the tool set he bought from gumtree. Went to Gallaria to buy Chris Cringle present for my work place. While we were there, I bought ingredients to make a meatloaf for Basil from Coles. Came home, watched another movie while fixing up the meatloaf.

Then, I received 2 consecutive missed calls from my dad. I don't answer when he calls becoz I will call back with the calling card which is obviously way cheaper. 2 consecutive calls meant that it was urgent. I quickly called back. He started off by telling me not to get too worked up, that Puggy has passed away. Then he went into cremation details, like how they will collect Puggy the next day, that it will cost this much if we want to leave the ashes at the columbarium & that it will cost this much subsequent months & that it will cost this much if we decide to keep the ashes.

Immediately, I stopped him & demanded to know what happened. At best, it was a story with no head or tail. At worst, it was a load of crap which I couldn't even understand. He said he was walking Puggy when he tried to bite someone. 1st, Puggy has never bitten anyone & being flat faced, I don't think he can actually open his mouth big enough to bite someone's leg. More likely, he wanted to charge at someone. So he yanked at the leash to hold him back. No details on what happened in between. Just that his tongue was hanging out of his mouth. Then, a young lad told him Puggy has no pulse anymore, his body was limp, he had already gone cold. How many hours have passed??? Who is this young lad??? Why didn't you bring him to the vet???

He said he doesn't know where the vets are. When I left for Perth, I gave my parents the names, addresses & phone numbers of 2 vet practice. 1 was for the nearest vet & the 2nd was for the 24 hr vet. This year's CNY when I went back, that paper is still stuck on the wall & I reminded them again about it. Now he's saying he doesn't know where the vets are??? Where did you bring him??? Then he went back to telling me the young lad told him no point in going to the vet coz it would just cost extra & there would have been nothing they could do since Puggy was already dead. He gave my dad the number for cremation services & he went on to repeat the cost of the cremation etc. I stopped him again. I said I wasn't interested in all these. I want to know exactly what happened. He went silent for a few seconds. Then he started to repeat the story of the cremation details again. I hang up on him.

From his half ass account, I think he either broke Puggy's neck or collapse his trachea pulling on the leash. But wouldn't that have taken excessive force? If it's only collapsed trachea, if you go to the vet they can perform emergency surgery. How many hours passed before he brought Puggy to this young lad that his body had already turned cold? Who is this young lad? Pet shop? I called the pet shop nearby but the guy on the phone said it wasn't his pet shop.

I feel so guilty becoz all of this wouldn't have happened if I brought him to Perth like I did with Ton Ton. My decision cost him his life. Why on earth did I think my parents would be capable of taking care of the dogs? They didn't want me to bring Ton Ton over, saying that they know how to take care of the dogs. Why must I bring him over? If I hadn't, Ton Ton could be dead too. I left Wang Wang becoz he's more of my dad's dog than my dog. I left Puggy behind becoz I thought it cruel to take 2 out of 3 dogs from my parents & also we didn't have enough money to send 2 dogs over. When we went back for CNY this year, I saw the less than best state they were in. Overweight, not much life in their eyes. I gave strict instructions on their diet once again. Why the hell didn't I decide to bring Puggy over then? Now nothing can bring him back.

Pug's life expectancy is about 16 years. He's not even 10 years old. I thought we had time. I tried saying goodbye with reiki. But I couldn't "see" his face in my mind, I couldn't even feel him. It's like he was just gone. All I saw were trees, in a forest or some sort. Then, a blob of light exploded into thousands of glittering lights that floated up into the sky. He really is gone. He isn't even on earth anymore. I caused his death.

7 Years Ago

7 years ago today, hubs & I started dating. It's an anniversary that I hold more dear than our wedding anniversary. It was a new beginning, my 1st relationship after my divorce. New relationships always start out with trepidation. You're learning about each other, wondering what the future holds.

I had an early finish today & we went out to swap our empty gas canister for a full 1. On the drive out, I teasingly asked, "Aren't you glad that you started a relationship with me 7 years ago?" There're no perfect marriages. We quarrel, sometimes really badly. We have good times too. We're such opposites. He doesn't think much of being politically correct. I prefer to be nice. But on the other hand, it'll only mean that he won't pretend to like you but secretly curse you in his heart. At the same time, we're so similar. Our love for food, our love for travels, our mentality towards marriage & finance.

I still send him off to work with a hug & kiss. He still greets me with the same when I get home from work. We irritated each other to no end. In fact, we all have nicknames. It started with Ton Ton. He has always been possessive & somewhat territorial. If he's in the bedroom, he doesn't allow Basil in. Similarly, if he's already on the sofa, he'll growl & bark at Basil if he attempts to jump up. But if it was the other way round, he'll just step all over Basil before planting his ass on Basil's head. So I called him the "big fat bully". Basil is no push over either. He'll push Ton Ton out of the way while Ton Ton is receiving scratchies from hubs so that he can take Ton Ton's place to be scratched. Hubs came up with this new nicknames for all of us. Ton Ton, the small (referring to size) bully. Basil, the big bully. He, the big fat bully & finally me, the house bully, becoz I bully all of them. That cracked me up good.

It scares me to think of the many couples who stay together without love between them & the possibility that we can be 1 of them. I'm thankful for the painful divorce I went through. Pain is a good teacher. Hopefully, I'm a good student.

Driving Incident

Oh dear. Nope, nobody crashed into my car. But people who've crashed into me were way nicer than this man who didn't. I really do wish public transport is an option for me. It is what it is & I'll try to keep as safe as I can.

I was driving to work yesterday morning & was approaching the city when it happened. There're 2 lanes in the direction I was travelling in & I was in the left like I always do as I believe in keeping left. This Hyundai on the right lane drifted past the lane divider without any signals on. I have no idea if he was trying to change lane without signalling or he wasn't paying attention & had just drifted out of his lane. Naturally, I slowed down becoz if I were to proceed & he really came into my lane, he would have crashed into me. It wasn't even a hard brake, nowhere near qualifying as e-brake. I think I lost about 10 km/hr in speed. This Hyundai probably realised that he was 1/3 into my lane & went back into his own lane.

Crisis adverted. Then I noticed this truck behind who continuously high beamed me non stop for perhaps 10 seconds. I check my mirrors rather frequently but the last time I checked, this truck wasn't behind me. I probably was also focused on slowing the car down enough to avoid the Hyundai coming from my right to be checking my rear mirror in the seconds prior to that. I ignored him. The left lane that I was on became the right lane somewhere further down. That was when I noticed the truck driver had cut into the left lane. He was held back by several slower moving cars & bus & we probably traveled another 2 km or so. About 100 m from the right turn into Vincent St on Fitzgerald, he finally caught up to me, flicked me the middle finger & drove off, cutting back into the right lane several cars down to make the right turn onto Vincent. That was a lot of trouble just so he could give me the finger considering that we were only 100 m from his turn.

I cannot say I know exactly what happened but he probably was following too closely behind me when I had to slow down for the drifting Hyundai. Maybe he thought I was braking on purpose to deter him from tailgating like some people do. I think this is probably the most possible scenario. I knew it wasn't my fault. I was just trying to avoid collision from the Hyundai. But the rest of my day, I felt absolutely shitty.

When I was safely parked at work, I texted hubs that someone gave me the finger on the way to work. He immediately texted back saying he knew it wasn't my fault becoz I always drive safe & I don't speed. That was even before I told him what had transpired. He's not siding me becoz I'm his wife. He's ever told me off very harshly when I was the 1 at fault. He told me that he meets these kind of drivers all the time on the road & not to be affected by them. But even till now, I still feel like shit. I'm not angry, just really upset & I don't even know why. Too sensitive for my own good.

What do people get out of being mean & nasty? Hubs showed me this quote he came across on FB. "There are many nice people. If you can't find one, be one." It's a great quote. It's something I'm striving towards too. Now I can only let time lift up my spirits & confidence again.

Midland Farmers' Market

In case you're wondering what am I doing on a Monday morning blogging away while I'm supposed to be working, I have the day off. (Surgeon is away, no list for the entire day.) I've just returned home from my car servicing which is 500 km overdue. It's actually quite hard to estimate when I'll hit the 20000 km mark with unscheduled pick ups & drop offs. Even harder when I can only book in on a day off. It always feels so amazing driving the car that had just been serviced. It handles better, the car is more responsive & as a bonus, it gets a complimentary wash & vacuum. If I'm excited about the wash & vacuum, it can only mean how severely the hygiene part of the car has been neglected. Lol. 

So. My colleague was telling me about her weekly trips to the farmers' market in Stirling, where she lives. It piqued my interest enough to try to find 1 near me which I did. Midland Farmers' Market opens every Sunday from 7 am to 2 pm. Ordinarily, I would have preferred to go early in the morning to avoid the crowd & to avoid the midday sun. But I had yoga & I didn't want to wait another week (coz next weekend's already packed to the brim again). By the time we got there at 11.50 am, most of the crowd if any, were gone. We were able to get a parking lot easily & we didn't have to elbow throngs of people out of the way (just kidding, I don't elbow people). 

1st, we walked through to the end of the market for a quick browse. I quickly identified the stall that received good reviews for its Dark Chocolate Salted Caramel Cake on FB. We got to chatting with the stall owner, Paul & he mentioned that it was hard to get right as the different ingredients cook at different times. So the honey would be burnt by the time the rest of the cake is ready. It took him a while to perfect the recipe & he now supplies various cafes & restaurants in Perth. I got 1 slice of the cake while hubs got a slice of banana bread for $9. Even hubs agreed that the cake's pretty decent. It was a little bit too sweet for me but probably will do very well with a nice cup of tea. Here's a picture of Paul with his award winning cake, photo courtesy of MFM's FB page. 

Next, we stopped at John's artisan bread stall. That late in the day, the popular choices, namely his White Sourdough & Pumpkin Loaf were all sold out. But we did get the Potato Loaf which according to my palate is just amazing. We haven't cut into the 2nd loaf which is the Olive Sourdough but I can just imagine it lightly toasted & well buttered. Yum. The breads were going for $6 a loaf but he sold the 2 loaves to us for $10 being that late into the day. 

There were many stalls selling fruits & vegetables. Some of the stalls are big, have huge varieties & have large trucks used to transport the produce parked right behind. But 1 make shift stall caught my eye. 2 elderly men were sitting on their empty crates watching everybody pass them by. They aren't the cheapest & they had about only 5 types of produce but we both felt we should buy from them. So we got a kilo of fresh broad beans, 3 onions & 3 garlic bulbs from them. The man who served us was a bit hunched over & he wasn't walking super well as he moved about weighing our selection. They were definitely more expensive but in life, there are more important things than money. I felt great buying from them & hats off to hardworking, independent seniors.

I turned 1 onion, 3 garlic cloves & the entire batch of broad beans into a beef curry, served with sliced potato bread for dinner. That was how we spent our Sunday. Hope you've all had an enjoyable weekend too! ;)

Our loot from the MFM. Total damage: $35 including the cake & banana bread.

De-podded fresh broad beans.

Beef curry with broad beans & potato bread.

Beautiful Positivity

There's too much negativity in this world to the point where positivity is quite a rare commodity. So I'm going to strive my best to post happy thoughts, more encouragement, less disheartening words. Ultimately, just remember that you alone hold the power of change, of courage & nobody can take that away from you. Allow yourself to dream. Allow yourself to hope. Set yourself on the path you want to be on & don't overthink it. This applies to everything in life. Above it all, always do good. Peace.

The Little Things

This post was in my draft box from the 24th Sept 2016. It was from the weekend that we went camping in Yallingup. 

There are many little things in my life that I don't really take much notice of. They're always there, sometimes little nuisances, sometimes little pleasures. Hubs parked the car as usual. I got out to open the door as usual. I was expecting excited faces, whining & scratching at the door, like they always do. Like they've not seen me in ages. Like they can't wait for me to get through the door. I was at the bottom of the stairs but there was nobody. In that split second, I remembered that we've just came home from dropping the dogs at the boarder's.

We had dinner while watching Supernatural as usual. Nobody to attempt sniffing at our food. Nobody fighting over who gets to lie on my lap. No Tonz who will not hesitate to step all over Basil & plant his ass in Basil's face. No whining as they wait for me to get their dinner ready.

Bed time. No Tonz who always beat me racing to the bed. Nobody to burrow into the little crook in the back of my slightly bent knees as I slept on my side. No Basil waking me at least twice in the night when he gets up to scratch himself or gets up to walk about before lying back down.

Too empty. Too quiet. Too unaccustomed not having the boys around. I missed them already & I haven't even left for our camping trip. We're such an integral part of each other's lives that being apart is hard.