I didn’t make time to mourn for JD, my 12-year-old daschund who died on 18 February 2013. My sister wrote a great eulogy on her instagram that goes: “JD was the best dachshund. She fought monitor lizards, bit mice, ate durians, understood Hokkien and battled cancer. She lived and gave the best 12 years any master would have dreamed of. I miss your short legs.”
The last time I saw JD I was getting ready to leave Penang. Tomorrow I go back to Penang, and she will not be there. I will not see her black little body run up to the gate, tail wagging and tongue a-hanging. There’ll be no more baths, no more walks up and down the neighbourhood so I could do a little spying and parading.
JD is the first death in the family. Not even my grandparents have gone. Sometimes you think the little people would not go first, but there she will be, in my front yard, buried at the side of the fence on the left hand corner. People want to die at home. I’m glad JD is buried at home.
Wan Phing Lim 