The belly of the beast

Thanks all for your kind words of sympathy and commiseration over the loss of Fabio. We're still a little off-balance, but the household dynamic is already beginning to shift to compensate for our lack of ballast. For instance:

Would we have seen this a week ago? Nope. A new era in Cani-Shmoolian relations begins, perhaps.

Inasmuch as there can be a bright side to these kinds of personal losses, the timing of it all seems to have fallen on the “better” side of the equation (“better” in the sense that it could easily have been much, much worse):

1) We're just over six weeks from our due date. Which means there will soon be new life to fill the gap in our hearts. It also means that Fabio got sick at a time when we could still devote our full attention to him — he was foremost in our thoughts, as he never could have been with a newborn in the house.

In addition to that, there has been a lot to keep us engaged, and partially distracted from our grief:

2) Spring. Sunshine, yardwork, mowing and weeding and longer walks with Linus. All good things that buoy the spirit.

3) Baseball. I treated myself to an Opening Day seat behind home plate this year, and what a show Felix put on for us. Nothing stirs up feelings of hope and promise like a decisive win on the first day of the season. And I practically had an umpire's view of the plate, and could watch his 97-mph heat melt the paint off the corners, and his dramatic curve diving from the batter's nose to Kenji's right toe. I could also feel the wind from Sexson's huge swings — one of which thankfully made productive contact.

4) Comics. The Emerald City ComiCon was last weekend, and my brother and I made a full day of it, hitting every booth and every bin. I came home with over 120 comics — mostly 25-cent stuff chosen solely on the basis of the title and the cover. Lots of Superman, plus handfuls of Teen Titans, Batman, Catwoman, Captain America, and Hawkeye (as a longtime fan of Green Arrow, I thought I'd give his purple-clad Marvel doppelganger a whirl). Picked up a few (pricier) gems, too: Joss Whedon's 3-issue Serenity series, some 1960s Brave and the Bold teamups, and a half-dozen issues of my favorite titles that were on the stands the day I was born. Oh yeah, and my brother found me an issue of Godzilla in which he eats the Space Needle. Must-have reading.

All in all, over the last four days I've had a lot to do and a lot to think about besides Fabio, and the worst week I've had in 4 years has been followed by what has been, all things considered, a pretty good week.

The last little happy fact is that 3 weeks ago I bought a new digital camcorder (standard issue for new fathers), and in getting to know its secrets and powers, I spent a lot of time videotaping (what else?) our pets. So I have a lot of very recent footage of the big guy, and our son will know his dad isn't fibbing when he tells the story of the giant Totoro that once lived in our house.