Death/Rebirth

Last Tuesday our older dog, ZuZu, had to be put to sleep. Which is another way of saying, euthanized. Tearfully, I was able to write about her last days on my HinesSight blog in It was a good day for our dog to die. Of course, it wasn't a good day. Not really. I wanted ZuZu to live much longer. What I meant was explained in the first part of the blog post. Don't get me wrong. I didn't want our beloved older dog, ZuZu, to die. But she did last night, put out of her misery by a dose…

One of the best things about being human is also one of the worst things: understanding that your death is inevitable. We have this capacity because of our evolved brain. Other animals, almost certainly, lack the ability to envision a far-off future that bears no resemblance to what's being experienced in the present.  This enables us to construct civilizations that have transformed our planet. Cell phones, symphonies, electric cars, and so much else wouldn't exist without our ability to imagine possibilities that could exist, but don't at the moment. But there's a dark side to what evolution has wrought. We…

Life is difficult. Sometimes really difficult. Like when someone you love likely is going to die soon. Our dog, ZuZu, is in the late stage of chronic liver disease. Her vet has told my wife and I that ZuZu probably has weeks or months left to live, not years. So the WillaMutt Strut event ZuZu and I went to today was poignant for me. (It's put on every year by the Willamette Humane Society, where my wife is a volunteer dog walker.) Here's photos of what likely was ZuZu's last time at the event. She enjoyed herself, as did I.…

The older I get -- which, sadly, seems to be happening continuously -- the more I ponder the not-so-cheery question, "What should my last word be?" Now, usually we hear talk of last words, not word. But since I'm such a wordy guy, in writing at least, I figure I should do something surprising and limit myself to a single Last Word. (An aside: I enjoyed reading the "ironical sense of words said before a disaster" in the Wikipedia Last words article. These are so great, they almost -- but not quite -- made me want to do the last…