How did I end up possessing the dog? She was handy. She was a growing puppy, easily accessible, a path of least resistance.
All the souls, the planets, the big bang, the black holes, my guilt, my innocence, my death — I was aware of them. None of this stuff was far away. None of it was close by. Some folks die and go to a reward. Some go to punishment. I was plain dead. I was an empty soul floating in vague semi-awareness.
The soul contains the body, not the other way around. Two things made possession different from original life, not that I remembered much, not that I remembered anything specific about my life.
First, there was the soul of the puppy, sharing her body with me. She clung to me. She was possessive, fierce, willful. She acted like I was an old friend, like she knew me. Her mind, her canine brain, driven by urge more than human thought, could never make me understand her acceptance. Happy to have me join her, happy to let my soul go into solution with hers, she was still insistent in marking and holding herself in the life she was given.
Second, there was that awareness, my formerly-dead-soul awareness that I was nothing but sort of… well, just sort of. I was a thin substance, and the puppy soul was syrupy with life. Possession worked both ways. I chose the puppy, but then I became the puppy. My priorities became puppy priorities. I had puppy thoughts, mostly directed by that puppy soul. Even so, I was still I.
Our first thought was more hunger than I could understand, if such a deep urge can be considered a true thought. Every movement, every impulse circled around to food. Any food would do. A sock on the floor, a shred of cardboard. We could beg, or we could take a longer strategy, plan like an adult human, like my old soul.