Desi's Spot

ser·en·dip·i·ty
[ser-uhn-dip-i-tee] Show IPA
noun
1. an aptitude for making desirable discoveries by accident.
2. good fortune; luck: the serendipity of getting the first job she applied for.
So this is pretty cool...


Desi left me many things for me to remember him by including the odor of pee pee under the spot on the couch where he used to sit. He apparently didn't mind that odor. I was told that dogs won't sleep in their own urine. But NOT Desi. He had absolutely no problem sleeping in his own urine as long as he was in the most comfortable spot in the house. That's just how he rolled.


He got used to it the first three months of his life when nobody would adopt him from the pet store. I'm sure they barely cleaned his cage and probably forgot to feed him too. He had a runny nose and just needed someone who really cared. And luckily for ME that's when I came into his life!!!


So now that he's passed on, the smell of his urine still lingers from under the cushions on my couch. There has been a part of me that hasn't wanted to clean the cushions where he peed, or the wall where he puked or the hair or other doggie DNA that he left everywhere. I clearly DO NOT want to let Desi go.


But - slowly I have been allowing myself to clean the puke off the wall. Dust the floors where his hair still lies. And today, I had a rug cleaner come in to deep clean the upholstery under the leather covered seat cushions on the couch.


I pulled up the cushion where Desi's spot was for the first time since he died and found bits of doggie biscuits and treats under there that had fallen through the cracks.


I never sat in that spot when Desi was here because it was Desi's spot.


Today I decided to finally have a professional come in to clean Desi's spot and waited from 4 pm - 6 pm for him to arrive. I got a call from the office and was told that they were running behind and would be there by 6:15 or 6:30 at the very latest. At 7:10 pm I called the office and nobody answered. I left a voicemail asking them to call me back to let me know if they were coming or if we were going to need to reschedule. Then I sent them an email. At around 7:25 my buzzer rings.


I was annoyed because I waited so long and knew that this guy was going to try and sell me on the higher price of service. I got the couch at IKEA and each section only cost $300 bucks. He told me it would be $125 to clean them both. I tried to haggle with him and told him I thought it was going to be $65 bucks. He said that's the base rate, yadda, yadda, yadda. The best he would do was not charge me tax.


I reluctantly agreed, because I don't have $600 bucks to spend on a new couch, although I would absolutely buy a new one if I did.


I told him that I really just wanted the one couch cleaned because my dog had peed there several times in the past. I wanted him to assure me that he would be able to get the smell out and he told me that he absolutely would. He told me he has dogs and knew he could get the odor out for sure.


Then he asked me, "Where's the dog"? I said, "He died." He said, "Oh my God. Please don't say that. I'm going to pretend you didn't say that."


I thought to myself, "Okay, here's another person that doesn't want to go anywhere near someone who's grieving over their dead dog." But he was a stranger so it was understandable.


We kept on wheeling and dealing and I still wasn't really buying any of his salesman bull and didn't really even like the guy. But at this point I waited so long and I just wanted to get it over with and hope for the best.


But first I wanted a guarantee. So I reiterated again that it smelled really bad but I didn't want to make him actually smell the cushion. Then he smelled the cushion and said: "This is part of my job. I have to smell the cushion." He had a thick Israeli accent and seemed like a nice enough guy so I just humored him.


I kept eyeing him to make sure that he was actually going to do the job and not just half ass it, take my $125 and leave. He started sweating so I went in the other room to give him some space to work without me breathing over him. Then all of as sudden the power went out. He started looking for the circuit breakers. I told him I didn't have any circuit breakers and he insisted I did. He kept asking me if they were behind this wall and that wall. I was like, "No man. I don't have any circuit breakers." Still he kept looking. Then he asked if it was behind some picture. And suddenly the image of the circuit breaker box behind the LA Marathon poster in my hallway flashed in my mind.


I was shocked. I said, "Clearly you've been doing this for awhile." He said, "Yeah. I've been doing it for a minute." Kind of needling me back. I actually kind of started to warm up to him at this point. He was smart and confident that there was a circuit breaker box IN my apartment, even though I insisted there wasn't and have lived here for four years. But INDEED there WAS!!!


The power blew out two more times.


Finally, he finished the job.


I was not sure that all the smell came out and told him so. He disagreed and told me so.


He reminded me of a male version of my friend Hadas who is always right about everything. I just let him be right. I figure, if it still smells after he leaves, I'll call the Company and have him come back. I'll complain about them being late and get a discount out of it somehow.


A lot of stuff was going on in my head during the 15 minutes that he spent cleaning Desi's spot.


Okay so now comes the part about serendipity.


He told me a story about his pit bull, Mama, who died at 9 years old due to complications from a stroke. It was a long drawn out process. She collapsed at a barbecue and he rushed her to the 24 hour animal hospital. She was in a coma for THREE DAYS but he insisted on staying with her the whole time at her bedside. The doctors refused to operate because they told him there was no way that Mama was not going to make it.


He still wouldn't leave her side. He picked her up, carried her into the exam room and put her up on the table. He sat by her side and tried to let her drink water. All of a sudden she started to sniff the water but couldn't really open her mouth to drink. But he was persistent. Finally she was able to take some sips of water.


Later he tried to get her to stand. He held her up and let her stand for a second and then she fell down. He held her up and she stood for a few seconds longer and fell down again. He held her up again and this time she took a few steps.


NOW he was pissed and he called in the doctor and told her "Take off your lab coat. You're o doctor. This dog is walking and alive." He told me the Doctor was astonished and said it was a miracle.


They observed Mama for some time and she seemed perfectly fine. They told him that she was good enough to go home.


He took her home and he said in the middle of the night she passed away. I asked him how she died and he said they wouldn't tell him so he assumed she was suffering.


This happened over a year ago and he still has his picture on his cell phone. I asked to see it twice. He also still has her leash by his bed which is where he said it will stay. He has two other dogs now but he still keeps her picture on his cell phone and her leash in it's spot by the bed.


This REALLY made an impression on me. It's going into the 3rd month since Desi passed away and it's just so excruciatingly painful at times and completely devastating. It helped me to know that I am not crazy. That many people have a bond with their animals that goes beyond their connection with people.


He told me how they had this routine every morning. A ritual that they stuck to daily. He said she was in his truck every day. He would walk around and keep her off leash and didn't have to look at her once. He knew she would follow him and be by his side the entire time.


I said that I feel like they are closer than even your socks or underwear. They are like your skin.


I told him how embarrassing it has been for me to be so devastated over this loss. I also explained that it was just me and Desi for many years so it feels like my whole family has died.


He assured me that he had practically gone crazy with grief for six months and could barely get through it. He has a wife and kids and still he said it was like his arm had been cut off.


I really understand this pain.


I really liked this man now.


He touched me on a very deep level and it was like the Universe sent me a messenger to tell me that my pain is real, it's valid and other people have the same deep level of pain over losing their dog as I do. I am so grateful for that message. I so needed to hear that.


He told me he had a dream about six months after she died where she nudged him in his sleep which was how she woke him up in the morning. She led him into the other room wagging her tail. He followed her around the house and down a hallway and then she looked back at him with that smile she always had on her face and disappeared. He said that when he woke up he felt much better. He felt like she had come to say goodbye.


At some point, I just broke down and couldn't hold my emotions in any longer. I apologized but he was totally accepting of it and welcomed my grief. He wanted to write his number down on the receipt he gave me but I couldn't find it. I was completely unglued by that point.


He told me to put his number in my phone and to call him next weekend so that he can take me to this dog park in Queens.


I thanked him for sharing his story with me and for allowing me to be so raw.


He insisted that it was nothing at all and by his tone I felt that he was letting me know it's perfectly understandable, natural and acceptable to feel the way that I do. Validation. Empathy. Understanding. From a total stranger.


The only thing that would have been even more uncanny was if his name was Desi. But his name was Neil. And Neil came to clean Desi's spot and make me feel like it is more than okay to grieve his loss.


I reached out to a couple of people who I am close with hoping they would be there for me but they weren't able to be. I know that people have their own concerns and their own issues on their plates but it was still disappointing to me to not have anyone truly understand my pain today. But this man Neil, truly understands my pain. Because he carries it himself everywhere he goes. And will until he day he dies according to him. And so will I.


I am positive of this because I know myself well enough to understand how deeply I've been cut and how severe this wound is. And there are some wounds that just do not heal. There are scars which remain there forever. It's true that scars can make you stronger and be beautiful in their own way. But they are still scars.


I played the character of Johnny in "Frankie & Johnny" by Terrance McNally and vaguely remember his dialogue about how beautiful Frankie's scars are to Johnny. I also think about the short student film I did for LA film school called "Angel" where I had to put my dog to sleep but she came back to me to help me find my way out of my pain. These are classic examples of life imitating art for me. Only life is so much more specific.


I grieved in that short film, but my grief was manufactured from a culmination of all the pain in my life mixed in with my imagination of what it would be like to lose Desi. I had his picture on set with me.


But this true reality is not as pretty as the world of cinema. And it lasts so much longer. It lingers. One of my acting teachers, Bill Hickey once said in acting class, "when the curtain came down you just knew that it wasn't over in real life for that actress".


I remember telling my sister Cheryl when I was grief stricken and collapsed on the ground outside the animal hospital that I felt like I was playing a scene. I felt like I was acting and this moment wasn't actually real.


I am so thankful and grateful that she was there for me and Desi. She still is. She has been there for me throughout this whole ordeal more than anyone I know. She has been such a good friend to me and to Desi.


The curtain outside came down outside that hospital scene months ago now but I'm still playing the scene today. Only now it feels totally real. I don't feel like I'm acting. I know that this is real life. I only wish that it wasn't.


I don't know if Desi will come to me in a dream. Sometimes when I close my eyes I see his face everywhere inside the blackness behind my eyes. One day, I imagined that I saw his little face peeking out at me from behind every alley and doorway in the street. It feels freaky. Like I'm losing my mind. But that man Neil told me that he felt completely insane with grief for the first six months himself. That he felt like he was losing it. And that he still feels it to this day quite often.


It's not just the insane feeling that is so frightening. It's the feeling of overwhelming panic. I start hyperventilating and it's so unlike me. I have to really concentrate to slow down my breathing until it passes. And there's that deep expectorant feeling of the mucous coming out of my body up through my nose like when you have the worst cold or flu and think it will never go away.


Right now, my ears are plugged up from blowing my nose so hard. It feels like I'm under water or I've gone deaf or my body is numbing out because it hurts too much to feel anymore.


And finally I have to just block it out. Shut it off. Or I will actually go mad.


Lately, I have been hearing things from total strangers that I desperately need to here. It's like there are all these angels and prophets among us walking around every day if only we open our ears and listen. It keep thinking of the lyrics of that Joan Osborne song "What If God Was One of Us"?


I didn't expect that the man who walked in my door at 7:25 tonight would be the one to let me know it was okay to grieve. But he did. Right after he finished cleaning Desi's spot.