We did another Facetime Friday yesterday. Bear, Officer Mittens, Omar and Oscar and I put on a show, with visits from Pat the Cat puppet and grumpy pig puppet. I also made shadow puppets which was spontaneous because the sun was coming in perfectly for it. I read them "Everyone Poops" a funny look at, well, pooping. We laughed and talked, it helps them a lot. We will do it again next week. At the very beginning when I picked up the Facetime call, the ladies all had animal masks on-and they said they were animals and they wanted to be adoptd into our farm! That just made my day!
But then they told me they had honored Opie. When someone dies at the residence, they put a photo on the front entry table so everyone can see and honor their life and passing ...and they chose to put Opie there. I’m so honored...so is Opie. I have to tell you it made me stop in my tracks. I was so touched and honored. I think I hit a wall. Opie was my partner, he was young, he was a natural. I am mad he was taken. The question,
"Why?" can only be answered with 'Because."
The sadness is piled on with the sadness I have for the country. If you can not acknowledge that there are hate filled whites that want nothing more than to see people of color gone, you are not seeing clearly. It is not about politics. It is about 20% or more of the country truly fearful that their white privlidge is being taken. We've been here before, we in fact never left it behind. If one thing comes of this four years I hope it is that people, white people, will begin to acknowledge this. And it is not all a bunch of neanderthalls that went to the Capital, it was your Uncle, your pastor [I know one who was there], your doctor, your neighbor...the people that went about their lives...until a leader stepped in and gave them a megaphone, and helped choose their mantras for them, they fed off each other.
So that is part of the real hurt of losing Opie. He was pure love. He wasn't inciting anything. He was just giving his time and love to old people, and to me. And now he was taken.
That is why this gesture of acknowledgment form the elders at Cove's means so much. It was and is a blessing that they ackowledged him, and in so doing ackowledged my therapy work.
