A meeting on the bridge

Gryphon died six years ago today, on a day exactly like this one - bright, clear, dazzling sun on fresh snow but a growing promise of warmth in the air. I have carried the moment of his passing and the burden of his absence for thousands of breath-struggling hours and thousands of miles. A scrap of paper I stuck to my monitor back then has never been disturbed since. It reads:

"And when he died the Loneliness Bird laid three cold stone eggs in my heart. And nothing was ever the same again." - Bryce Courtenay, The Power of One

Nothing has been the same, but something important has changed. This year I have encountered a spirit guide in the animal world. I haven't talked about it much - partly because it's intimate and large beyond my understanding. Well, okay, also because some people think you're nuts if you start talking about voices from the beyond, let alone that of a dead dog.

She has shown me some pieces about herself, but her impact has been more about the ways of communicating, with animals, with people. And she has entirely changed my perception of death. She has made it no more than a matter of being willing to follow her through that veil, if I can see it that simply.

Early one morning a few weeks ago, somewhere between asleep and awake, I found Gryphon, on a level like nothing I've sensed since he died. Powerful in its tangible manifestation. It was like I knew it was a semi-dreamstate, but that that was only because my mind needed to create some physical dimension in which to place us both. (A nearly empty house, that I don't recognize.) He was in the doorway as I entered, I passed through with a rising realization of joy, crossed into the next room and put down whatever I was carrying. He followed behind as I crossed the room. My legs left me and I sank down along a wall as he came into my arms - I could feel his warmth and strength and his heartbeat, dug my fingers into all of his wonderful texture, and felt his kisses on my face just like the day he died, and just then my alarm clock went off.

I have wept every time I've thought of it. With grief and gratitude both. I have hurt so badly for six years in missing his integral presence in my life, and now am finally beginning to perceive a reality in which he is not gone. And nothing was ever the same again.