and yes, after Plato found his way through the fence and demolished the vegetable garden, I was angry. Because I had warned you. Because you dismissed my concerns as “neurotic.”  Now the cold weather is here. You will need to take risks that might have been avoided.

More precisely, you will need to ask others to take risks on your behalf. I was wrong to take my frustration out on you. I’m sorry. I’m sorry about Plato. I loved him, too.  Perhaps his name was bad luck? I never cared for the original Plato. But I loved our Plato. And I am weary of digging holes for those I love. We are either digging holes or filling them … we’re never whole.

Understanding is retrospective and usually too late to be of any use. So, no regrets. We live, we love, and then, as Oscar Wilde told us, we kill the things we love. I admit that in my distress (after the event), I blamed you. I cursed and cried that he would be alive if  River had been more vigilant. That was unfair. Blame is a coward’s balm. So, now I must confront my rage.

How does one confront something so intimate and, at the same time, so foreign? When I was a child, my first pet was a cockatiel. I was devoted to him. I tamed him, taught him to whistle the Colonel Bogey. I loved him. One day, while he sat on my shoulder, he nuzzled into my neck, as was his habit, and I leaned in slightly to acknowledge him. I don’t know why, but he bit into my ear and would not let go. I bled profusely. I recall the shock and anger I felt. How could he hurt the one who loved him most?

I closed my hand around him and pulled until his locked beak loosed its grip on my ear, and he then dug into my thumb. I nearly crushed him to death. A wave of rage ran through me and terrified me. I think the intensity of my feelings shocked me. I slipped him back into his cage. I did not know myself anymore.

It is not enough to survive, River.