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"Dear God..."

genkakugenkaku Northampton, Mass. U.S.A. Veteran
in General Banter
Received in email the other day from a sender who had likewise received it:

Our 14-year-old dog Abbey died last month.
The day after she passed away my 4-year-old daughter Meredith was
crying and talking about how much she missed Abbey.
She asked if we could write a letter to God so that when Abbey got to
heaven, God would recognize her.
I told her that I thought that we could, so she dictated these words:

Dear God:

Will you please take care of my dog?
Abbey died yesterday and is with you in heaven.
I miss her very much.
I 'm happy that you let me have her as my dog even though she got sick.
I hope you will play with her.
She likes to swim and play with balls.
I am sending a picture of her so when you see her you will know that she is my dog.

I really miss her.
Love, Meredith

We put the letter in an envelope with a picture of Abbey & Meredith,
addressed it to God/Heaven. We put our return address on it.

Meredith pasted several stamps on the front of the envelope because she
said it would take lots of stamps to get the letter all the way to heaven.
That afternoon she dropped it into the letter box at the post office.

A few days later, she asked if God had gotten the letter yet.
I told her that I thought He had.

Yesterday, there was a package wrapped in gold paper on our front porch
addressed, 'To Meredith' in an unfamiliar hand.
Meredith opened it.
Inside was a book by Mr. Rogers called, 'When a Pet Dies.'
Taped to the inside front cover was the letter we had written to God
in its opened envelope.
On the opposite page was the picture of Abbey & Meredith and this note:

Dear Meredith:

Abbey arrived safely in heaven. Having the picture was a big help and I
recognized her right away.
Abbey isn't sick anymore.
Her spirit is here with me just like it stays in your heart.
Abbey loved being your dog.
Since we don't need our bodies in heaven, I don't have any pockets to
keep your picture in so I'm sending it back to you in this little book for
you to keep and have something to remember Abbey by.
Thank you for the beautiful letter and thank your mother for helping you
write it and sending it to me.
What a wonderful mother you have. I picked her especially for you.
I send my blessings every day and remember that I love you very much.

By the way, I'm easy to find.
I am wherever there is love.

Love,
God
BunksmisterCopeDavidsndymorn

Comments

  • federicafederica Seeker of the clear blue sky... Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubt Moderator
    Damn onions....can't see a thing.
    DavidNirvana
  • BhikkhuJayasaraBhikkhuJayasara Bhikkhu Veteran
    ahh... heaven is such a wonderful comforting thought for our fearful minds isn't it? it's ok don't worry you'll see your dog and everyone you love up in heaven and you'll get to live there for all eternity doing.. well who knows lol.
  • federicafederica Seeker of the clear blue sky... Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubt Moderator
    I just found it to be sweet, particularly as a child's feelings were considered.
    I don't believe in God one way or the other, and frankly, I would have reacted differently to the girl's mother.
    I guess I haven't developed a sufficiently deep sense of cynicism yet, to treat the tale with any amount of disdain....
  • BhikkhuJayasaraBhikkhuJayasara Bhikkhu Veteran
    edited February 2014
    no disdain here really. I do suppose that I have a certain aversion to stories that seem to want to deliberately tug your heart strings. I think it's a personal issue kind of related to how governments try to use fear to corral us into certain emotions and reactions, an issue of control. If you want to hear stories, talk to someone like me who's been a child protective services investigator and case worker, you'll get all the heart tugging stories you need :).

    Looking at it through the eyes of a 4 year old western child it makes perfect sense, I remember how I reacted to the death of my pets as a child and how my 9 year old nephew ,who i've helped raise, deals with loss in a christian culture, although I was amazed what came out of his mouth the other day about how all beings have to die and it's a part of life. I try not to teach him any buddhism at the behest of his mother and grandmother, but I guess it's rubbing off ahaha.

    I've also had enough experience with children in traumatic situations to see what kind of comfort these kinds of thing bring to children. It's only as we get older that we lose that "magic" as it were. Maybe about the same time we find out there is no Santa Claus.

    What I'd really be interested in seeing is this same situation through the eyes of a 4 year old child from a buddhist culture and how that would play out. Maybe wishing for the animal to have a birth as a human in the next life so it can practice dhamma.
  • genkakugenkaku Northampton, Mass. U.S.A. Veteran
    Which parent has not lied to a beloved child ... not so ornately, perhaps, but still....
    anataman
  • JainarayanJainarayan Veteran
    federica said:

    Damn onions....can't see a thing.

    At least it wasn't Rainbow Bridge. Someone sent it to me when my cat died, and I made the mistake of reading it at work.

  • cvaluecvalue Veteran
    @Jayantha said
    What I'd really be interested in seeing is this same situation through the eyes of a 4 year old child from a buddhist culture
    I remember my grand mother told me when I was a child: "Be happy for it because finally it escaped a life of cat. We need to guide the cat to remember to be reborn as human being. So I told the cat to try to be choosy, do not be so stupid to go inside another cat again."
    BhikkhuJayasaraEvenThird
  • cvaluecvalue Veteran
    The same thing with chickens. I remember when my older cousin received the order to kill a chicken, before doing that, she always said: "I don't want to kill you but they made me do it, so please, I liberate you now from this life, in your next life, try to be reborn human."
    Bunks
  • karastikarasti Breathing Minnesota Moderator
    If it's a true story, it's still a lovely gesture on the part of the person who went to the effort to comfort the little girl, despite how you feel about their beliefs.
    Anyone who celebrates Santa and Easter Bunny and Tooth Fairy with their children, is in effect, lying to them in some sense. Intention as always :)
    anataman
  • genkakugenkaku Northampton, Mass. U.S.A. Veteran
    Just because a thing is untrue doesn't necessarily mean it's untrue. For example, someone once told me about Buddhism. :)
    vinlyn
  • NirvanaNirvana aka BUBBA   `     `   South Carolina, USA Veteran
    edited February 2014
    Surely the above post meant to say, "Just because a thing seems untrue doesn't necessarily mean it IS untrue." ???

    "What is Truth, but that which moves us; which is a higher truth." Poetry is its own form of knowledge and admits of no real logical constraints. The poetry of the heart trumps that of the head, at least when we are pulled out of our own little skins for a moment or two. Life is fundamentally a mystery and our "certitude" that it is not is mere delusion, a being caught up in the false promises of this world. If life were not a mystery, how can you explain the saints among us in all their compassion and self-giving?

    Hinting at this mystery's ubiquity is really not that complicated; hence it seems it's nearly always best done in the tales we tell our children in simple language.
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