Dr. Ernie Ward
It had been a tough year. The toughest you can imagine.
Two weeks prior to the end of his tour in the Middle East, a road-side bomb had taken her father. She’d been with him a grand total of one-hundred eighty four days her whole life. A scant six months spent with her father out of her five years. Her dad was a photograph, a video chat, a man her mom and grandparents told her about. She loved him dearly even though she hardly knew him. And now he was gone.
Before his deployment a year before she was born, her father had brought a puppy to keep her mother company while he was away. Booker was a mixed Lab and shepherd; big enough to scare a burglar yet small enough for a fourteen-month old to hold on to for her first steps. In many ways Booker was a father figure to her: strong, protective, caring and playful. Booker was her best friend and the two were inseparable. She had clung even closer to Booker since her Dad passed away, so much so that her mom was becoming concerned. She’d overheard her daughter whispering to Booker about her father not long ago. “Bookie, can you talk to Daddy?” her baby girl had asked their dog as the two played. “Can he see us from heaven?”
When her mother told me about this, I told her I had spent countless hours talking with my dogs as a child. I reasoned this may be therapeutic for her daughter and encouraged her to discuss this with a counselor. My guess was they’d use Booker as a way to foster the discussion on her father’s passing. I didn’t have to tell her I thought Booker was the best counselor a little girl could ever have.
As for Booker talking to her Daddy, I advised her to ask her daughter what she thought. If her daughter believed Booker could talk to her father, I’d tell her to have Booker send messages for her. It might be a good way to find out what sorts of issues and questions she had about her father’s life and death. If she didn’t know if Booker and her father still communicated, I’d tell the little girl that no one really knew for sure but that I was certain her Daddy could see and hear her from heaven.
I saw the girl again recently. After she told me how excited she was to see Santa, she asked me a question. “Dr. Ward, how does Santa know what Booker wants? He can’t tell him.”
I recalled the conversation with her mother a few months earlier. “What do you think? Do you think Booker can talk to Santa?”
“I don’t know if he can talk to Santa, but he talks to my daddy all the time.”
I could barely hold back my tears. “I’m sure Santa knows exactly what Booker wants for Christmas. I’m also sure your daddy loves and misses you very much.”
Our pets heal us in ways we never can. They teach us lessons we can never teach. Booker is so much more than a pet. This holiday season be thankful for the furry friends we are fortunate enough to share our lives with. And be especially thankful for Booker and the tens of thousands of pets helping mend broken lives this year.
