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When I married my wife, I inherited a relationship with a husky puppy named Juneau. I call her a puppy, but she was an old lady. She had Addison’s disease, a long-term endocrine disorder in which the adrenal glands do not produce enough steroid hormones. She had hip issues which sometimes made it difficult for her to walk. She sometimes had bladder control problems.
Despite all this, she had the heart of a puppy — jumping into my arms anytime I came through the door, laying her head on my feet as I typed stories on my computer late at night, grumbling in her odd way of talking when I didn’t give her head scratches when she wanted them.
Thursday, I buried her at my parents’ farm in a small plot overlooking the pastures and the mountainside.
Juneau was an escape artist. Everyone in our neighborhood knew Juneau. She’d escape out the front door when she spied an opening, or we’d leave her in the backyard for a heartbeat and she’d jump the fence.
When I saw her body laying on a sterile metal table at the clinic, I kept thinking she might prance up and lick me in the face. She’d escape death, too. I just knew it. The vet carried her to my car in a bag. I put a blanket over her. My wife and I held each other. We cried.
Not even a year ago, my other puppy, Sakesan, died of cancer. She was a concerned and somewhat anxious little (actually big) pit bull mix with the kindest heart of any dog I’ve ever known. Losing them both in a year has been hard on me, but it’s been even harder on my wife, who views the dogs as not only her babies but as extensions of herself.
All we have left is Cricket—the ornery and confused one. And that’s good. We need pups in our life.
Dogs make us human because they remind us what we ought to strive to be: to love unconditionally, to jump for joy at the sight of our family, to run and run and run and collapse in the grass and to lick everything that tastes good.
If my dogs gave me anything, it’s the steadfast reminder to cherish the little things. To feel what it’s like to breathe cold air, feel warm sun, a loving touch. These are small gifts. Small blessings. Life is cruel when we forget them.
So it goes.
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Photo credit: Pixabay