Levi

Tonight Levi and I did an amazing thing...or well, another "first" for he and I. We went for a walk. This probably doesn't seem so amazing to anyone else but to he and I, it was truly amazing.

See, I have never walked Levi alone. I always walked him with Richie. We didn't do it all the time but when we went for a walk we almost always walked Levi on a Sunday evening, after a big Sunday dinner and we would walk him around the neighborhood Richie lived in at the time. We walked him around Colt Drive, Greenhill, Keswick and then finally on Wood Creek.

I am not sure the date of our last walk but tonight it haunted us as we took off down the driveway. When Levi saw me putting my tennis shoes on in front of the door and then holding the leash he did what he always did for Richie, he started jumping up and down and getting excited. This at first made me smile but then the tears started. So we set off...of course Levi "marked" everything on our journey and had to stop and sniff at everything. His ears were perked up and he was so energetic. He hasn't been this way in a while.

I knew where we were going as soon as I picked up the leash from the garage. I wanted to go on the path of our last walk with Richie. We got to the playground in our neighborhood and went left. From there we took the wooded path along the creek and lost ourselves in the woods. I did as Richie did and I took off the leash and let him go. He ran around, sniffed, and just played in the woods. He never went far, he never did when we were with Richie.

This is where it go hard. I remembered exactly what Richie was wearing...ratted out kaki shorts and his blue TA shirt with holes all in it. He had on his grey tennis shoes with no socks. I remembered him perfectly. We were talking about all the traveling we were doing and when we got to the clearing where they were putting in a road for a new neighborhood we stood there talking and watching Levi. I told Richie how I loved my job but the traveling was killing me and I joked that when I got pregnant I finally could stay off a plane. He smiled, didn't say much, just said that who would have imagined him going to New York ever? We laughed a little, talked about the yard and then he whistled for Levi and we started back. On the way home we talked about the kind of grass we wanted to put in our yard. He pointed out some yards and I told him which ones I liked. It was a nice evening with my husband and the tears continued as Levi and I took the same path.

This time though, when I got to the clearing I saw the new houses and I called Levi back so I wouldn't lose him. I sat there for a while just looking around and silently crying for Richie and that night. I probably looked crazy to anyone in the neighborhood who could see me but those houses just made me so sad. I wanted that night back and those houses symbolized just how much time had passed since that special last walk we took.

On our way back I took Levi to this deep water hole. Richie never would let him off, he always thought we would get in trouble. Tonight, I didn't care. I know how much Levi loves to go jump into water holes and swim around and I know that he misses his swim time in Tennessee so I threw a stick in and told him to go for it. He dove in head first, I'm not kidding, head first and came up sneezing water! I threw the stick a few times and you could tell he loved it.

As we walked up the driveway, me emotionally drained and wet from his shacking water all over me, and Levi physically exhausted for his swim, we were a sight I'm sure. It is just me and him now and my heart hurts just thinking about that. Levi is the only living thing on this earth besides me who knew what it felt like to walk in those woods with Richie. I wonder, did he miss him too tonight? Did he feel my sadness and did he wonder, where was Richie?

I may not be a mother to a child yet but tonight I really saw how much I love the child I have. I know that tonight Richie was up there proud of me for taking this walk. I know this was another step forward for me and I'm glad it was with Levi, the dog he loved most in this world.