sigh

Better by far you should forget and smile than you should remember and be sad.
~Christina Rossetti

We were at Magnum's sister's yesterday. They don't live that far from us, but we really don't see them very often. She got divorced and remarried a few years ago, and the story behind all that sort of cooled things between us. They're starting to warm up again though, and I'm happy to leave that past behind . It was a nice, casual get together.

She has an ancient dog - about the same age as Wolfgang, which in dog years is ancient. She's a mutt of no obvious breed. She's got a bit of chow chow in her which makes her soft and fluffy and about as tall as a typical chow chow. She's deaf, so voice commands are useless, but it didn't matter since she's such an old lady dog, she doesn't get into much trouble and she moves very slowly.

But never stops.

She circled the house the whole time we were there, doing this old lady shuffle. Just following some path laid out in her own little world she was in. Round and round and round she went, without stopping unless she would come up against some sort of obstacle that impeded her forward movement. Someone nearby would remove the obstacle, and the circling would resume. She was like a large furry Roomba. On auto-pilot.

My SIL said they had to resort to giving her some drugs at night to keep her from doing that for 24 hours. Most likely, there was some dementia involved along with who-knows-what. Clearly her days were numbered.

In fact, I learned this afternoon that sweet Sarah the pooch was euthanized today.   Well, she had a good long life, and that's why it's sad.

On top of that, there's a kid who went to school in Ohio today and won't come back.  He had such a short life and that's why it's sad. 

Blue Monday.
.