Believing is Seeing

Savannah on the beach at Seabrook.

Eyes come in pairs for a reason. Each has a different job to do.

The mind’s eye focuses on the task at hand, while the blind eye erases all the rest.

Take Savannah, a retriever. Like Katy and Holly before her, she lives to fetch. Tasked with retrieving a stick, she laser focuses on its flight, then snatches it from the air, oblivious to the smaller dog sprinting beside her.

We humans are the same.

In one study, subjects tasked with counting the number of passes made between four basketball players famously failed to see a gorilla in their midst.

In another study, drivers tasked with turning left search the road for approaching cars and fail to see an approaching biker until it is too late.

The sad truth is that to focus on this is to fail to see that.

Now add belief to the equation. Belief shapes one’s field of vision, expanding or contracting what the mind’s eye takes in.

After self-identifying as either lucky or a loser, test subjects were tasked with delivering a package across campus. A silver dollar was then placed in the path they would each take.

The lucky ones spotted the coin and the losers failed to see it.

A belief that good things lay ahead enabled the lucky ones to see the good that others could not.

Which brings me back to Savannah.

Ten joyous years of fetching on a beach close to home abruptly ended when her mobility vanished in a span of just hours. She could no longer run . . . or walk . . . or stand . . . or sit . . . until, finally, she could no longer even lift her head. Shallow breathing and goodbye eyes were all that remained.

That Savannah would soon be joining Katy and Holly was now plain to see. So, I lay there beside her, rhythmically stroking her thick black fur, while rhythmically whispering “Katy and Holly will be fetching you soon,” willing it to be true, willing her to believe.

Sometime later, Savannah lifted her head and gazed at the corner of the room. Moments later, she did it again, a little to the left this time. Two. There, but unseeable to me. And then the three of them were gone.

“Seeing is believing,” right? But, sometimes, believing comes first.