I Can’t Say Goodbye Yet

But yesterday I had to. I still have over four months left here, but I’ve already had to say my first goodbye.

It was Dr. and Mrs. Philip, an elderly couple who live in a small house on the Chacko Homes grounds, as well as in Calgary, Canada. They arrived in India in October, when the weather in Canada began to get cold. And now they have gone back there, as the weather in India has started to get hot – or, I should say, miserably hot (because hot is a constant here).

I knew they’d be going, but their departure still caught me off-guard. On Sunday evening, as I was returning from a walk, the doctor stopped me and said they’d be leaving on Wednesday. Wednesday? As in three days from now? Yup! I was bummed.

The doctor and his wife are the ones who always greeted me early in the mornings when I went out for my walks. He’d be reading the paper, she’d be watering the flowers, and I’d pass by with a smile and a wave. 30 minutes later, on my way back in, the doctor would look up from his paper again to make an impressed comment about how fast I walk. “That gets my heart rate up,” I’d say. “Good, good,” he’d reply. “Now don’t forget your cool-down.”

I’m going to miss that…

The doctor has become a sort of mentor figure for me over the six short months that I’ve known him. I had to pass by his driveway every time I went from or returned to Chacko Homes, so we had many opportunities to chat. And, of course, there were the early morning encounters that always made my day start off brightly. I stopped at the house for one last time on Monday night to exchange contact information and to tell the doctor and his wife how much I would miss seeing them first thing in the morning. She smiled sweetly, and he let me know that they’d be thinking about me and that they would always be there – in that driveway, watering the flowers and reading the newspaper – in spirit. Now, when I go out for my walks, I remember that, and, although I refrain from waving, I still have to smile.