Farewell Xena

Edward took this picture of Xena looking out the window of his room. However much I proclaim not to believe in any kind of afterlife, I cannot help but see this as Xena looking out to her next, bright destination. Her size relative to the picture seems to represent the distance she is traveling. I don't feel like the darkness of the room represents any darkness in her life, just that the destination is so much brighter. May all beings everywhere be safe, well, happy, and at peace.

Xena's cancer went from invisible a month ago to sizable lumps on her face and throat, and it was getting harder for her to eat every day with one side of her mouth looking very sore. When you looked into her mouth, there was a hole where her teeth had been that looked too big to fit in the space on that side of her head. This is where food would get stuck whenever she ate, and it would quickly be a smelly mess if it wasn't rinsed out right away. As always though, she was calm and patient with all of this, allowing me to do whatever was necessary with minimal fuss. She probably could have gone on for a few more weeks, but I thought it was better for everyone if I was there to make the decision and to be with her when the time came. Xena passed away calmly on Monday, April 30, 2012.

We seem to take euthanasia for granted with pets but go to any extreme to keep humans alive no matter what. I've always thought I wouldn't want to be kept alive artificially if it got to a point where I could no longer appreciate life. Similarly, I like the idea of Xena passing before her life is nothing but suffering. I recall reading Nietzsche on dying at the right time, which when I read it now isn't as congenial as I remembered it, but nonetheless serves to raise the question of dying while one is still vital, rather than waiting to wither away. But then you have to actually end things when there's still potential left for some quality of life, and one is therefore abandoning that potential. This lost potential is particularly difficult here because Xena couldn't tell me her opinion, I had to decide whether to 'take' it from her. Additionally, the decision was pushed up because of my departure for Sri Lanka. If it were not for that, I would have waited longer. But as it was, if we waited someone else would have had to make the decision, which is a lot to ask of anyone. And Xena wouldn't have known as well whoever she was with at the end.

I've only ever had one other pet 'put to sleep'. That was my cat Antigone, who suffered organ failure when she was only five. I was living day-to-day then, driving an uninsured car with an expired registration in LA because I couldn't afford anything, and by the time I took her to the vet, she had stopped eating, and the vet said there was nothing to do but let her go. I adopted Lagi and Xena a few months later, when the emptiness of my apartment outweighed the sadness of the loss, and it no longer felt disrespectful of Antigone's memory. Lagi passed a couple of years ago, at about 14, of some similar organ failure. We didn't even know he was sick, he just started gasping one day, and was gone I think by the time I ran crying in to the vet's office with him in the carrier.

Xena's death was different because I knowingly chose the day and time. No matter how much I'm convinced it was the best course of action given the circumstances, that part still made it feel wrong. When someone's death is 'premeditated', we are especially harsh on the perpetrator. It's hard not to turn that same harsh judgment towards myself, and it's even harder not to feel like I'm “getting away with something” if I don't judge myself so. Maybe part of it just that, when I think of her and experience the pain of missing her, it's easy to confuse that pain with a judgment that I've done something wrong.

Farewell Xena. Say 'Hi' to Lagi. Lick him on the head for me.