Midnight Memorial
A couple years ago, my husband took up genealogy as a hobby. He’d spend his Saturdays squinting at old census records, marriage licenses, and other faded documents. But occasionally he’d come across a yellowed photo. Most of these were family portraits. The more recent ones were more candid. They gave us a glimpse of our ancestors’ day-to-day lives, whether it was a weary woman toiling over a washboard in a high-necked black dress, or a group of kids giggling together in a field.
I think a lot about what people will know about me from the snapshots I’ll leave behind. Centuries from now, when my descendants live in an Amazon-run corporatocracy, they may look stumble upon the photos we took. And they will be absolutely sure of one thing: my husband and I really loved our dog.
Our dog, Midnight, passed away about a year ago. We took thousands of photos of him, especially as he got older, so we’d have something to remember him by. I still forget he’s dead sometimes. I hear a rustling in a corner of a room and assume it’s him. I have a dream, and he is alive and warm and cuddling deeper into me on our living room couch. Or I’m working from home, and I absentmindedly start talking to him. Each time, that same realization forms, that same pang of loss hits me. It’s softer now than it was right after he died. It’s no longer a punch to the gut, just a sharp twinge in my heart. I’m not sure it will ever go away. Maybe I’ll always feel that faint echo of loss.
We found ways to mourn that suits us. I wrote an obituary right after he died and posted it online (shown below). My husband still updates Midnight’s Instagram page @ midnightthepuggle on #MidnightMemorialMondays. I’ve included these on my website so that my little fur baby can still bring people joy even though he’s already crossed the rainbow bridge.
Obituary for Midnight McHugh-Glerum (07/23/2021)
Dave and I put Midnight to sleep yesterday. I would give anything to relive the last thirteen and half years I spent with him. Midnight was born on my parent’s sunroom floor when I was eighteen years old. As the runt of the litter, his mom rejected him, so I spent many hours giving him the affection he couldn’t get from her. I sincerely believe that, because of this, Midnight saw me as his mother on some level. I don’t think I can ever fully articulate how much this dog lit up my life when he was alive. He taught me what true, unadultered, unconditional love was. Even when I was tired and frustrated with him, even when I spent far too long away from him, even when I was just in a room with him making no effort to interact with him, he gazed at me with love.
The only person Midnight loved as much as me was Dave. Before Dave and I started dating, Midnight was notoriously scared of men, and petrified of every man I dated. It didn’t matter how many weeks, months, or even years I dated someone, Midnight was terrified of them. I was worried the first few times Dave and Midnight interacted. Dave had never had a pet before, and Midnight had never warmed to any of the guys I’d been with that grew up with dogs and insisted they could win him over. But when Dave and I had only been dating for a week, Midnight got up on Dave’s couch and rested his head on Dave’s leg. And in that moment, I knew that things were going to work out with Dave, because he was charming enough to even win the dog over.
Midnight won Dave over, too. We’ve spent so much of our relationship coming up with jokes, songs, and even slang for Mr. Midnight. We created a 90’s sitcom theme song for him. We replaced pop songs with lyrics about coaxing him to use the bathroom in the morning. We even created terms for how he arranged himself so he could extort more cuddles from us. His favorite position was ATH, or “ass to human” because that was the best vantage for receiving scratch scratches above his tail. He carefully wedged himself between us on the couch when he could, because that spot had Maximum Petting Potential.
Midnight was a unique dog. He was reserved— I’ve always joked that the reason he lived so long is he took the opposite strategy of “live fast, die young.” He didn’t like long walks or going to parks. He never learned to play fetch. He didn’t enjoy barking— sometimes my neighbors didn’t even realize I had a dog because he was so quiet. The only dog thing Midnight enjoyed was cuddling and being with his humans. When I was home, he became my shadow. He would follow me everywhere in the house when I was awake. He watched me work from home the whole pandemic. When I would lie on the bed when recovering from treatments I received for my chronic pain conditions, he would nuzzle against me so I could spoon him.
The only thing Midnight loved almost as much as Dave and I was eating. That dog lived to fill his stomach. He was an equal opportunity binger, who pushed the definition of edible at times. Dave and I have spent many, many nights in the doggy ER after Midnight ate something he didn’t: a jar of coconut oil, uncooked rice, napkins soiled with food. He was a master at snatching human food. He lost couch privileges for a few days after he gobbled down half of my Moe’s burrito in one bite. He learned quickly that he could get to food on my parent’s dining room table if someone didn’t tuck their chair in, and once ate my sister’s birthday cake. The only thing he did not enjoy was vegetables. I once came home to find his bed strewn with shredded lettuce and sliced tomatoes while my sister loudly exclaimed that she didn’t know what had happened to her sub. I always expected this dog to die in the middle of a bowl of grapes or a bag of dark chocolate chips.
So it was cruelly ironic that, in his last few weeks of life, Midnight completely lost his appetite. At first the vet thought it was just an ulcer, but his upset stomach soon turned into acute kidney disease. This last week, we learned in the worst way possible that there are ICU units in vet hospitals. He was there for a week, and by the end we were hopeful that his kidneys could heal if we could just get some nutrition back in his body. The vet recommended we have a special tube installed in his neck to feed kidney-safe wet food to him, because he couldn’t heal without getting calories back in his body. We were worried that the dog who was infamous for his love of food would lose his zest for life when he couldn’t eat anymore. But instead, he was just so happy to be held by us, to be in our presence, as we fed food through his tube. He was still so glad to spend time with us, beaming at us anytime we touched or spoke to him, never showing his pain. We were shocked when we learned that his kidneys were now shutting down and he would be dead in two days.
We arranged to have a vet service come to our house so he wouldn’t have to die in a clinic. He’d spent so much time being traumatized by vets recently, I knew his last moments would be filled with terror. I’m not sure how we slept the night before we put him to sleep. We were so worried that we’d wake up to his cold body in his crate. But each time I awoke in the night, I heard his distinctive snoring and sighed in relief. We spent his last day cuddling him in every possible configuration and spot. We rotated him from the floor, the couch, the bed, depending on his comfort level. By the time the vet showed up to put him down, we’d worked him into a contented stupor. We continued to pet him, even when the sedation took over and he probably couldn’t feel it anymore.
After he was gone, I put him in my lap and held him like I did when he was a puppy, before he got so big that having him in my lap was uncomfortable for him. He was still warm, and for a few minutes I petted him, forgetting that his spirit was gone. When I could hold him no longer, the vet carried him to her car in a baby bassinet, tucked under a blanket.
We’re taking the day off to pack up the reminders of him until we’re less raw. His weekly pill organizer, which I reached for, and realized with pang, that it didn’t matter what day’s pills I grabbed because he’d be dead in a day. The supplies we used to feed him through a tube (ironically, we’d finally perfected this process on his last day). All of his food and training treats. So many of these things remind us of things we used to see as chores but would give anything to have to do again. So many of the nuisances of having this dog would now feel like a blessing. I’m even going to miss seeing his black fur scattered on my white clothes. I’m going to miss the dog smell that greets me every time I come home. Midnight is the only living being who I’ve seen almost every day in the last decade, and there are so many reminders of him around my house.
I don’t think I was ever going to be ready to say goodbye to this dog, but I’m glad I got to be with him for nearly fourteen years. Two weeks ago, his sister from the same litter died from cancer, which makes me think God had an extended warranty on these dogs that recently expired. Or maybe they just wanted to go to the rainbow bridge together. Midnight is gone, but I will never stop talking to him in my head. I’m going to miss you, my sweet fur baby, and I will always love you.
