Home

 It's where I want to be. But I guess I'm already there.

  Being back in Whitehorse has seen a swirl of activity, emotion, and a well-needed feeling of normalcy. It feels like we're almost there in terms of picking up the pieces of our life and re-assembling them into something  that resembles what we've been striving towards. It looks different somehow than what we thought it once would be - things will always be different after this experience (which is ongoing, and will be forever) - but it's something that still has beauty and drives us forward.
  Looking at photos from September, I realize that things have changed. Some forever, and some just for a little while. Six months ago, I was still glowing with the vitality and life that a summer in the Yukon nourishes in anybody, and now, I'm a paler, skinnier version of that person, with a little less shine around the eyes and a little more on his mind (albeit less on his brain!). But these things can come back. A few push ups and lunges, a jog a few times a week, getting back to work, a few days out on a Yukon lake, a few minutes making Hadley laugh or Meg smile; all good medicine for getting back to life. Some things are changed forever, and no exercise or experience will revive them. They are gone. But such is life. What these things are is less easy to describe, but there's a hole somewhere in the both of us that will never be filled again.
  This became ardently clear yesterday when we sat in the same sort of sterile, cold office that we've grown used to over the past several months, and watched as a vet injected our sedated cat with an overdose of anaesthetic. Her heart stopped soon after, and she passed over the line of life and death, whatever that looks like. For the past week, she had been suffering from Feline Fatty Liver Disease, and despite the vet's and our efforts, she wasn't getting any better. As a hunter, I've shot and killed animals and watched them die before, and it's sad,  but our experience yesterday was something very different. It belonged in those holes that will never be filled again.  It sounds more dramatic than losing a pet cat. But that's what's changed.
   It's been a dramatic few months, with family weddings, a couple of moves, a new house  new jobs, new lives, losing loved ones, creating and gaining new loved ones, and all of the stresses, joy, grief, and other emotions that go along with all of those things. And yet somehow, we're back where we started almost five years ago. Home. It's where we want to be.

Kitty. She was a cat. A good one.

  

For grandparents, aunts, uncles, and other interested parties, Hadley's continued growth can be witnessed here.

For those of you that knew and loved Kitty (if you knew her, you loved her), you can go here.

And now, David Byrne and friends: