Valentine's Day yesterday - no gifts or cards were exchanged, but I left a little note on the kitchen bench for Nina:

I love you
I miss you
I want you

The note was gone when I got home, but no mention or recognition of this note has been made since - not sure if it pleased her or annoyed by it (maybe it has ended up in a diary somewhere).

I had been thinking of saying more, but the more was more likely to upset, and that was not an outcome I wanted.

If I had added the other lines, the note may have been something like these:

I'm sorry that I've proven to be such a demonstrable {& maybe disappointing} failure
I often wish that we could start again (slowly), and in doing so we could learn what each other likes
But I also worry that I wouldn't know how and that I would just continue to prove how much of a loser I am

Of course when I came home on Monday (and Tuesday), Nina was in a very low mood, and I worry that notes such as the above would just make things worse.

I awoke this morning at 4:30, and the house was extremely quiet ... too quiet. I could hear the occasional sound of Nina breathing beside me, but nothing else apart from that constant background high pitched squeal that I always hear (like the sound of an old TV warming up).

What had me worried was that I couldn't hear our puppy snoring ... anywhere - the house was too quiet, and she's probably on her last legs. I couldn't help wondering if she had gone outside somewhere to enter her final sleep.

I thought that would be ironic {I've probably misused that word} given she has a vet appointment today which is likely to cost a fortune in replenishing all her drugs.

After 15-20 minutes of straining my ears, I eventually decided I had to get up and check up on her - I found her downstairs sleeping quite quietly (but alive!!!) in one of the baskets, so I went upstairs to get her morning tablet, and when I popped downstairs again, she was walking around - she took the tablet and followed me back upstairs to go back to sleep under the bed (while I got ready for the day ahead).

Yes, she could live to see her next birthday (she'll be nine) or beyond ... or she could go downhill quickly and not last our the week - either way she's a special puppy and deserves all our love while she is with us.