Sean DeMerchant
Inactive
Hi All,
The following words are graphic, unpleasant, and sad. Please do not read them unless you are prepared for them as they entail graphic depictions of death.
My experience today has left my uncentered and I want to express it. While I took no photos, the words themselves are visual in nature and some may not wish to read of the death of a pet.
[text way below]
In the USA it is often said that bad things come in threes. On Wednesday I learned that a friends 17 year old dog had passed on.
Dennis at 17
The following words are graphic, unpleasant, and sad. Please do not read them unless you are prepared for them as they entail graphic depictions of death.
My experience today has left my uncentered and I want to express it. While I took no photos, the words themselves are visual in nature and some may not wish to read of the death of a pet.
[text way below]
In the USA it is often said that bad things come in threes. On Wednesday I learned that a friends 17 year old dog had passed on.
Dennis at 17
His kidneys had failed and he had stopped eating and had to be put down.
Thursday I mentioned this to a friend and recieved a tale of how here family dog had died recently and how at the store the other day with her mother she had caught her mother buying dog treats for a dearly beloved but passed on 17 year old.
[The graphic part starts please do not read if you do not like graphic depictions of death. Please note my intent is not to portray lurid details, but to place thoughts into formal words and portray some visual elements about which I am confused.]
Today, Friday, I was about to leave and go take some photos and after putting my gear in the car a neighborhood cat skulked by. I did my usual making kindly sounds at cats. Or perhaps I said kitty-kitty or something similar. Whatever noise I made, the intent was kindly. Shortly after I finished making noise and when the cat felt its position relative to me was safe to run for it, it ran about a bush and towards the road. I remember thinking it would be awful if it ran into traffic or something similar.
Sadly, that thought was prophetic as the cats crazy dash towards the road was followed by cars coming both ways and two thuds as it was struck by a car on the far side of the road (50 MPH speed limit). At this point I moved so I could see that cat and saw violent and powerful deformed movements that I have never witnessed before in a feline and the cat went still. The car that had hit the cat then callously drove on without checking to see if they could take the cat to a vet. The car behind the car that hit the cat then also drove on avoiding hitting the cat.
At this point the cat had gone still and my thoughts were on what I could do for the cat. I do not know where the local vets office is and decided that getting the cat out of the road was the first step. Aware that approaching a wounded animal is unwise I went and found a handy floor rug so that I could safely approach and move the injured animal without being injured myself. I stopped the traffic coming both ways on the road with a raised flat hand as those directing traffic use and went to get the cat from where it lay. The first thing I noted was the pupils were fully 100% dilated on the cat which seemed very odd and moving at the same time. I then used the rug to gently get beneath and around the cat in case it reacted violently to any pain I induced and carried it unreacting out of the road where I laid it upon some freshly mown grass leaving behind a few small blood stains on the asphalt.
Its pose remained the same and the eyes unmoving and fully dilated without any pupilary color visible at all. And then I stared into those empty eyes for a while as I accepted it was dead and I could do nothing more for it. No rush to find a vet, not even a final kind and loving word for a beautiful stranger. In the end, the poor cat died alone in great pain in the middle of the road. The only thing I can say that is positive is that it only took me a minute to get to the cat to take it from the road and it was already passed on at that point. At this point, knowing I could do nothing for the cat I left it there and moved on to the living.
I then began canvassing the neighborhood ringing doorbells and talking to people to find its owners. Knowing that a domestic cats territory is about 3-5 acres (not many houses away out here in the country) I slowly worked around the block until I found what were likely to be the owners. At this point the man I met let me know that one of the individuals in the cars I had stopped to remove the cat from the road had told the mans wife who was at work what was witnessed and he had already collected the body from where I had left it. I heard denial in his words, but his eyes were red and the neighbor did/does have a similar cat. But he also told me the neighbors had not been there as long as the cat they have/live with. And the feline I saw die had only been around the neighborhood a short while (4-8 weeks). The man said the cats markings matched but without eye color he was unsure and since the cat rarely came home before dark it was too early to decide if it was him or not. I suspect this was denial and he noted he would not be updating his wife until she got home as she was having a hard enough time.
And that is the tale, but not my questions/observations. The pupilary responce with complete dilation surprised and fascinated* me. And what I suspect was the owner's denial based on being unable to see the eyes' colors.
Now, I wish I had closed to poor beast's eyes so that its owner need not have seen such a soulless sight and not just a still and almost sleeping visage on its face.
Is this pupilary response to death normal? Is this why movies depict the closing of the dead's eyes as a standard response to a being's passing? Anyway, these questions are not meant to be morbid, but simple curiosity as I found the completely dilated eyes to be a visually powerful and bizarre thing to witness.
I never did take any photos although I did go out where I intended to go. But I am still feeling retrospective over what I had seen and I am off center and not feeling creative at the moment.
thanks,
Sean
* It was hard to look away, not that I found it pleasent or other such positive things.
Thursday I mentioned this to a friend and recieved a tale of how here family dog had died recently and how at the store the other day with her mother she had caught her mother buying dog treats for a dearly beloved but passed on 17 year old.
[The graphic part starts please do not read if you do not like graphic depictions of death. Please note my intent is not to portray lurid details, but to place thoughts into formal words and portray some visual elements about which I am confused.]
Today, Friday, I was about to leave and go take some photos and after putting my gear in the car a neighborhood cat skulked by. I did my usual making kindly sounds at cats. Or perhaps I said kitty-kitty or something similar. Whatever noise I made, the intent was kindly. Shortly after I finished making noise and when the cat felt its position relative to me was safe to run for it, it ran about a bush and towards the road. I remember thinking it would be awful if it ran into traffic or something similar.
Sadly, that thought was prophetic as the cats crazy dash towards the road was followed by cars coming both ways and two thuds as it was struck by a car on the far side of the road (50 MPH speed limit). At this point I moved so I could see that cat and saw violent and powerful deformed movements that I have never witnessed before in a feline and the cat went still. The car that had hit the cat then callously drove on without checking to see if they could take the cat to a vet. The car behind the car that hit the cat then also drove on avoiding hitting the cat.
At this point the cat had gone still and my thoughts were on what I could do for the cat. I do not know where the local vets office is and decided that getting the cat out of the road was the first step. Aware that approaching a wounded animal is unwise I went and found a handy floor rug so that I could safely approach and move the injured animal without being injured myself. I stopped the traffic coming both ways on the road with a raised flat hand as those directing traffic use and went to get the cat from where it lay. The first thing I noted was the pupils were fully 100% dilated on the cat which seemed very odd and moving at the same time. I then used the rug to gently get beneath and around the cat in case it reacted violently to any pain I induced and carried it unreacting out of the road where I laid it upon some freshly mown grass leaving behind a few small blood stains on the asphalt.
Its pose remained the same and the eyes unmoving and fully dilated without any pupilary color visible at all. And then I stared into those empty eyes for a while as I accepted it was dead and I could do nothing more for it. No rush to find a vet, not even a final kind and loving word for a beautiful stranger. In the end, the poor cat died alone in great pain in the middle of the road. The only thing I can say that is positive is that it only took me a minute to get to the cat to take it from the road and it was already passed on at that point. At this point, knowing I could do nothing for the cat I left it there and moved on to the living.
I then began canvassing the neighborhood ringing doorbells and talking to people to find its owners. Knowing that a domestic cats territory is about 3-5 acres (not many houses away out here in the country) I slowly worked around the block until I found what were likely to be the owners. At this point the man I met let me know that one of the individuals in the cars I had stopped to remove the cat from the road had told the mans wife who was at work what was witnessed and he had already collected the body from where I had left it. I heard denial in his words, but his eyes were red and the neighbor did/does have a similar cat. But he also told me the neighbors had not been there as long as the cat they have/live with. And the feline I saw die had only been around the neighborhood a short while (4-8 weeks). The man said the cats markings matched but without eye color he was unsure and since the cat rarely came home before dark it was too early to decide if it was him or not. I suspect this was denial and he noted he would not be updating his wife until she got home as she was having a hard enough time.
And that is the tale, but not my questions/observations. The pupilary responce with complete dilation surprised and fascinated* me. And what I suspect was the owner's denial based on being unable to see the eyes' colors.
Now, I wish I had closed to poor beast's eyes so that its owner need not have seen such a soulless sight and not just a still and almost sleeping visage on its face.
Is this pupilary response to death normal? Is this why movies depict the closing of the dead's eyes as a standard response to a being's passing? Anyway, these questions are not meant to be morbid, but simple curiosity as I found the completely dilated eyes to be a visually powerful and bizarre thing to witness.
I never did take any photos although I did go out where I intended to go. But I am still feeling retrospective over what I had seen and I am off center and not feeling creative at the moment.
thanks,
Sean
* It was hard to look away, not that I found it pleasent or other such positive things.
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