On this day in 2015, April 17th, the four of us said goodbye to our first Akita, Kayko. I read somewhere once that owning a dog is a countdown to heartbreak. I know that's true for any type of pet you may have, and it's even true for us if you think about it.
Nothing could have prepared me for that day - mostly from the perspective of knowing there was nothing I could do for Shannon, Gabriel and Connor.
We had taken her to MedVet and they shared she had cancer in her snout that had moved into her brain. Thus began the family meeting of what's best for her versus what we want. Everyone was not aligned on the ultimate decision and to this day I feel terrible about it.
As mentioned before in the Hook write-up, the Akita breed is perfect for our family and Kayko was a great first exposure. She was a crucial part of the family during a crucial time in our sons lives, and she is dearly missed.
It's funny how you can be exposed to music in life. During my initial obsession with the story of Hachikō, I stumbled upon the video for Bittersweet. The first time watching it I had no idea who the band was but I knew whoever made the video was a GENIUS. Because the lyrics fit the Hachikō story so well. So I did the research and thus my love of the band Within Temptation was born. The movie scenes are from the 1987 Japanese movie Hachikō Monogatari (yes I own it).
My sons used to watch a lot of Anime, and I spent some time watching some with them. One series, Naruto, I thought had fantastic music. Some corny and ridiculous, some poetic and beautiful, some dark and depressing. I would lump Moonlight Talk into that last group.
Back in the beginning of YouTube, kids used to make "AMV's" - Anime Music Videos. They would take clips of Anime shows and put them to actual music. And thus, this is how I discovered the band Kill Hannah - and Scream was the very first song I ever heard from them.
The point to all of this is I cannot listen to any of these three songs without immediately thinking of Kayko...the good and the not so good...
Ghost of a Chance 