Funeral of Machi in the woods

- October 06, 2019

The sun had set and it had just turned dark. Machi was in the kennel, the door was open. Suddenly a dog appears from the forest and runs dangerously barking to her. Wayra, her sister, leaps up and races to protect Machi and chases the intruder dog. Machi got so scared, she struggled out of her kennel on her 3 legs, comes up the stairs of the cabana where she falls from her feet and collapses of weakness. Edo takes in his arms and back to her kennel, lays her down, she is panting, breathing so hard, her scared eyes looking at him in terror. She finally gives in to her exhaustion and collapses again, this time completely still. She has now gone.

She was 5 years old, had been suffering of bone cancer and had a big tumor in her leg that had suddenly grown in the past 2 months. The veterinarian operated to removed the tumor and also had to remove the leg. She recovered well and could walk and even run again on her 3 legs. It had been about 6 weeks. But about a few days before I got to the farm, she had stopped eating as much, was isolating herself often and slowly got weaker and weaker. Some days there was hope and she was eating again, but she also seemed to be suffering a lot. The suffering that I noticed was mostly in her mind: she always seemed panicked and worried, always looking up, looking around, she never seemed to be resting. It was definitely time to end her suffering and Edo had realized it was time to put her to sleep. It was a Saturday so he have to wait until Monday. But the intruder dog fright accelerated everything and she died, finally ending the suffering and resting in peace.
It was about 8 pm, the sun had just set and it was getting dark. Machi laying dead in her kennel and I spend time mourning her death and crying. She had been just a sweet presence during my days here and I was cuddling her a lot everyday.

'We have to take care of the body' said Edo, 'it is already starting to smell and animals will come for her.' What animals?! 'We have to go bury her, I know a right place a bit farther om the land in the forest.' And so began a whole adventure: getting the shovels, getting a sheet to wrap Machi in, wrapping her in the sheet and putting her on the wheel-barrel. And so we set off, in the night, with shovels, a dead body in the wheel-barrel, I had my rubber boots on and working gloves. We carried a strong flashlight to light our way. In the end, we got to the place Edo thought of burying her. All around was either sand or really hard ground. Another option: burning her. This would avoid any animals digging her up from a ground that is too soft. It was also the easiest solution and it was really cold. 'I know a place, we can burn her in the big barrel that is already there. So we changed the plan, placed the barrel in a suitable location far from trees and were now gathering dead wood from around. We started a fire in the barrel to get it really hot. Waited a while, adding more wood. Then we carried Machi up and put her in the fire, put more wood on top and stayed for a while making sure the fire was burning well.

Such a beautiful sweet dog, burning in front of me. Rest in peace Machi.