Letting Go is Hard To Do.

On graduation day, I let go of Elyse, the beautiful dog I'd been training since January. Today, I let go of my precious puppy, Kristina. I have been Kristina's only student trainer since she was four weeks old, and have essentially - along with the staff at Bergin U. - raised her into the nine month old young lady she is today.

So much of my life has been about learning to let go.
Not just learning to let things or people or places or animals go; but to let the meaning of things and people and places and animals - change - in the scope of my understanding. When my mom died, I necessarily redefined what it meant to have her with me. I necessarily redefined what it meant to live and to die, reconstituting all manner of loss into nothing more than a meter by which to measure how much I'd loved and been loved.

Moving between my many fated homes throughout adulthood, I've learned that missing the places where I'm not is the price I pay for loving the one where I presently am. As a pet sitter and now trainer of service dogs, I know how to love each and every dog with all my might, even while knowing they are not mine, and that I will inevitably be letting them go at some point. In this context, I have learned to sacrifice my needs, my desire to grip too tightly; for there is a bigger picture in which I am a devout believer, and to which I am morally obliged.

While I am consciously willing to work on behalf of this higher purpose - honored, in fact, to do so - I break down in moments and simply feel the anguish of saying goodbye.

 I get tired of being strong. I get tired of staving off selfishness and self-pity. I get tired of pretending that letting go of people and places and animals I love with ALL MY HEART doesn't hurt like hell. I am tired of being stoic and noble about all the letting go; and shamelessly praying for something - someone - to which or whom I can unabashedly hold on.