Free Your Mind

.. and the rest will follow

So sings EnVogue in their song, “Free your mind.” This lyric has been continuously playing in my mind recently as I am currently anything but free.

The other day I was watering my plants and a glimpse of the wooden boxes on the bottom of my Iiving room shelf caught my eye. Four boxes, two stacked on the left and two stacked on the right.

A plaster paw print leaned on one stack and a beagle holiday ornament engraved with the name “Charlie” leaned against the other.

Call me strange, but they are the ashes of four of my dogs who have crossed the Rainbow Bridge. Two beagles—Charlie and Buster, a chihuahua named Mojo, and Max—my beloved yellow lab who I lost just last May. He was preceded across that bridge by his chocolate lab brother, Moose, who had suddenly died in December, just months earlier.

It’s been a rough year.

What struck me as I paused to look at the boxes, to remember each dog and their unique personality and all the love they brought to my life, was the boxes.

Just like these dogs are now reduced to ash on a shelf in my living room, so too, is my mother, albeit in my father’s living room.

This is what you have to look forward to, I thought.

We all just end up in a box of one kind or another.

And it struck me—although I am currently physically trapped due to divorce proceedings, I can free my mind.