Loving Animals

I was sitting at my desk at work yesterday when my phone buzzed — a text from my friend Michele’s phone. I’d sent her a short poem in the morning — something I’d been doing for months, along with silly pictures of my corgis or flowers, or little love notes — check-ins to let her know I was thinking about her. I’d been messaging with her at least a couple of times a week ever since she was diagnosed with uterine cancer last summer.

I remember the evening she told me and a mutual friend over dinner at a little seafood place where we ate fried fish in a too-hot restaurant that overlooked a pretty little lake, how we had a great time with each other despite the news, how vital she looked, how optimistic she was that she would get through it it. Michele had already beaten breast cancer a few years before, and she was tough. But this time, serious surgery and treatments awaited her, and though I didn’t say it, I was very worried.

I thought Michele was texting me yesterday, but instead, her husband was responding with the news no one wants to deliver, or to to receive. He was bravely taking on the loathsome job of sending the hardest message to her friends: “She was doing great and then just suddenly lost her strength and slipped away. It was a shock.”

It wasn’t entirely a shock — despite how shocking it felt. Michele had come to my house for a wonderful visit six weeks ago between chemo treatments when she had a bit of energy, during which the dogs obsessively jumped into her lap and kissed her all over. She was straightforward with me about all of the medical interventions that had taken place and all the ways they hadn’t reduced the cancer, how in fact it kept spreading, how the final option was an experimental drug trial. “I know the question on everyone’s mind,” she said. “If nothing else works, I have about six months.”

I tried very, very hard not to cry then.

It wasn’t my first go-round with a friend with cancer, or my first with ineffective treatment and the tough reality that comes with it. Yet it still felt like a punch in my solar plexus, as always. It was difficult to breathe. I didn’t want her to have to manage my emotions, but she knew me. “I’m okay with it,” she said. Mostly. She was worried about her beloved horse, Star, and the promise she made when adopting her: that Michele would be her forever person. Preparations had been made for a loving new option, of course, but still — my beloved friend, who I met while we were both volunteering at a humane society, both of us tenderhearts for animals — felt guilty about leaving her. Michele cried then, and complained about the way it was a tearless cry, chemo having robbed her body of the ability to actually weep.

I got her a glass of water. I hugged her intensely, if gently. I knew it might be the last time I saw her. It was.

I know her family recently came to visit her, as well as some of our old pals from the shelter, and her long-time best friend, who took her to see Star just a couple of weeks ago. I knew her husband was being hugely helpful, supportive, and brave. She texted me that she was at peace.

So, those six months her doctors predicted ended up being only six weeks — that was the shock. I suppose the other shock was how much I still thought I could emotionally prepare myself for her death since I’ve had too much experience with this kind of loss already. And I’m shocked that I actually tried to convince myself of that; I really should know better.

I already missed getting filthy taking care of shelter dogs with her one night a week, which we did for years. I will now miss our brunches and dinners, where we tried out new restaurants (her favorite was next to a horse rescue, no surprise) or got take-out and brought it to my house. She always brought good wine, often a squat bottle of delicious rosé with a super feminine pink label and cap (what was its name??). She always left with a memoir from my bookshelves. She never shied away from the griefy ones, and she always brought them back and told me what resonated with her. During that final trip to my house, she brought back Lost & Found by Kathryn Schultz, and I’m glad her last read was such an excellent one.

I will miss her sweet messages, her good cheer, her excellent attorney’s brain, her unique fashion sense, her generous nature. I will miss her rooting for me and my writing, how much she loved my pets like her own, the way she consoled me through my own challenging experiences the past few years.

I spent last night scrolling through hundreds of photos, badly wanting to see Michele’s face, very surprised that from all the time we’d spent together over the past 15 years, and the zillion images of dogs and horses we’d shared, that I couldn’t remember many pictures of us. In the end, I found only one of her — but it is absolutely perfect. It was taken a few years back at the horse rescue next to the great brunch place. I remember well how one of us brought carrots and we spent a long time in the barn and out by the fenced-in fields, petting, admiring, and feeding, talking with the caregivers, dropping dollars in a donation can — doing what brought us together in the first place: loving animals.

I’m so grateful for the happiness on her face in the sun, her hand on the silky neck of a beautiful mahogany-colored horse, smiling at me. I like to think this is how she feels again now, wherever she may be, free.