I don't know what to call this...

(Like I said, I don't know whether you'd call this a requiem or something else. All I'm saying is that I've wanted to do something like this for my dog for quite some time, but it hurt too much up until recently...so yeah. I just had to put this out somewhere, you don't even need to read it.)

I don't even know what to call Sela. She wasn't a pet, not to me. She was more like...a best friend, a big sister. She always protected me and my brother. She never got mean unless she thought someone was threatening us...there was the one time I was over at the neighbor's house with my brother, returning something the kid next door had left at our house.
They had their Boston Terriers outside, and they got excited to see me and were jumping on me and all that. Next thing I know, Sela comes tearing around the corner of the house and skids to a stop next to me. A split second later, there was a fight going on. None of them were hurt, luckily, but the neighbors got pretty angry.
There was another time when I was out in the woods, and this group of teenage boys came down the railroad tracks and started throwing rocks at me. I ducked behind a log and probably would have been there for hours if Sela hadn't charged down the hill and chased the guys off.


I felt like the most terrible person in the world when she died and I wasn't there for her. And for what? I had come into the computer room to check the Internet. Next thing I know, my dad is yelling for my mom, I run in, and she's gone.
As if that wasn't bad enough of me, I couldn't even bring myself to go to the funeral they hosted. I hid in my room. And now I regret it, but it's not like I can go back and change the past. Heaven knows I would if I could. If I did, I would go back and tell the vet who--only a MONTH before Sela died--to check her heart. We took her in for a checkup, and they didn't even check her heart. Did those people even go to college? I'm beginning to think they didn't.
Somehow, though, I don't think Sela would blame me, or my family, or anyone else. She wasn't that kind of dog. It was her time to go, and she did. Doesn't mean I have to like it, or anyone else.

It's stupid, but I like to think that she's in a place now where she doesn't have arthritis anymore, and she can chase all the squirrels she likes. Like I said, stupid, but it makes me feel better.

I love you, Sela. <3 See you soon.