The House We Lived In (Part 2)
The house we lived in
was not one house.
Five houses
five cities
across three states
by my fifth birthday.
The pace slowed down then.
Only three more
houses and cities
through high school.
I got used to
saying goodbye.
To family,
including two sets of greats,
six aunts and uncles,
cousins lost track of.
All six-to-seven hundred miles away.
To neighbors,
to teachers,
to friends
from school and church.
To friends
from sleep-away church camps
I attended religiously
since I was in elementary school.
To friends
from state choirs,
quiz teams,
Governor’s Honors.
Goodbyes became a monthly routine.
I also had to say
lasting goodbyes.
Death was routine.
Congregants Dad buried.
Two great-grandparents
and three grandparents
before I’d turned thirteen.
Pets.
So many pets.
A couple of dogs who ran away.
Many cats and dogs
succumbing to old age.
A baby chick,
freshly hatched,
underneath the weight
of my toddler body.
One dog who hung himself
on a choke collar left on in the car.
I wasn’t yet in preschool.
In third grade,
I went home early, feeling “sick.”
A Lhasa Apso from the school neighborhood
ran across the street to greet me.
A car hit him.
We rushed him to the vet,
but he died the next day.
I was truly sick then.
Around sixth grade,
a Saint Bernard puppy
appeared in our basement,
slipping through the gate
our dogs had escaped through.
He slept inside
my headboard cupboard.
I knew that wouldn’t last.
The worms got him
before his first vet appointment.
In high school,
my brother discovered the pelt
of one of Dad’s rabbits
in the roadside trashcan
after we’d been fed
this strange “chicken” dish.
Somehow,
I never got used to
saying goodbye.
It always felt like a little death.
I fought impermanence with all I had.
Eventually,
I stopped attaching.
It’s taken me decades to realize there’s no protection from impermanence.
And I’m not sure I want there to be.