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Her name was Lucy, but as often as not we called her “The Goose.” She came to us a few weeks before our wedding from my friend Gigi. She was a big, black and brown shepherd mix, with enormous, fly-catching ears. She wasn't elegant, but she was beautiful in her own way. Ours was her fourth home, and we soon found out she had some baggage.
I wanted a dog who could go with me on my daily walks, but Lucy was frightened of cars and absolutely terrified of buses. She would crab walk down the sidewalk while looking over her shoulder, and she'd flinch at every passing vehicle. I tried to “desensitize” her by taking her out every day, but, until her later years, she never lost that fear, and by the time she did, she wasn't in good walking shape. Her main exercise ended up coming from chasing tennis balls at the park around the corner.
She didn't like riding in the car either. The first day we had her, we took her for a ride, and she covered every inch of surface with slimy, anxiety induced drool. Eventually, she learned to tolerate cars. She learned that they can take her to fun places, like the river or the beach or a mountain trail, but she always panted nervously the whole trip.
She also hated solitude. At first, when we would go to work and leaver her alone, she would chew things. Not like other dogs who chew things to bits, but in a nervous, methodical way. For instance, she would chew the corner off of a couch pillow and pull the stuffing through the small hole, making a big mess when we got home. She had a talent for focused chewing. With her front teeth, she could destroy a Kong, a little speck at a time, in a matter of hours.
In 2002, we moved to a new house with a dog run in the basement. On the first day, we put her in the dog run. I came home from work, and Lucy was running around the house. She went berserk and busted out of the dog run. She would not be confined in that way.
But for all of her baggage, she was a great dog. She guarded the house with zeal, barking perhaps a little too often, but loud enough to deter any would-be burglars. Her ongoing aural assault on the mailman became something of a joke, even to him. It's hard to tell a guard dog not to guard the mail slot.
Her world centered around food, and one could practically set a watch by her internal clock, especially when it came to the all important eight o'clock snack. Early on, we caught her scooting (a sight both comical and pathetic) and discovered she had a skin condition brought on by food allergies. So we switched her to vegetarian food and never looked back. She didn't mind, so long as it was food.
She hiked in the mountains, swam in the ocean and romped in the park. Although she was very submissive and flighty around dogs who wanted to sniff her out, she would protect us in an instant. Even in play, she would come to defend my toddler son when we roughhoused.
She never dug holes or chased cats or drank out of the toilet or ran off.
We understood and honored her eccentricities. She was no nuttier than we, and she fit beautifully into our uniquely functional family.
When Owen was born four years ago, Lucy got to the park less and less. She put on weight, and eventually she injured her hind leg, an ACL injury. After that, she walked with a limp and experienced some pain. But she was still happy, always at the door when I got home. We would laugh at how quickly she could go from bummed out to stoked. Her expressions said it all. Crazy eyes and cock-eared meant anxiety. A fixed stare meant she was using jedi mind tricks to get something. She truly lived in the moment, and she reminded us to live in the moment as well.
Last week, when my alarm went off, she didn't hop around the foot of the bed as usual. She just laid on her pillow. She didn't follow me to the bathroom while I showered as usual. When I got home, she wasn't waiting at the door as usual. All she could manage was a thumping tail wag when I approached her. She wouldn't get up, not for food or relief.
I took her to the vet and discovered she had arthritis in her spine and a possible slipped disc. I gave her pain meds, and she seemed to be responding. We were optimistic, but over the weekend, while we were at the coast, her hind legs gave out. She was paralyzed, and she spent Saturday night panting and whimpering. Her eyes begged me for relief. She couldn't understand what was happening to her, why her legs wouldn't work,why she felt such pain. The meds were doing very little for her.
This morning, we carried her to the van using a blanket as a makeshift stretcher and drove to the Emergency Hospital. Our worst fears were confirmed. She had a ruptured disk, and only expensive surgery held any promise. The doctor knew what had to be done, but she didn't push it. It was our choice. We spent about an hour and a half with Lucy as she laid sedated on a gurney. We cried and said our goodbyes. We told her there would be no cars or buses or vacuum cleaners where she was going, but there might be a mailman to bark at.
She died peacefully, seconds after the injection.
I used to joke that she was the second best dog I ever had, but that's a lie. She was the best, and I'll miss her, we'll all miss her, terribly.
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