One of the sad truths of owning a pet is that under normal circumstances, the pets precede us in death.  Worse, we are often placed in the position of having to have the pet “put to sleep” to relieve them of their suffering.  I just received an email from a friend telling me their boxer has lymphoma, which is what George of the Highlands had and it is fatal.  I do not know what my friend has decided to do as yet, but with George we decided end it quickly for him.

The appointment was made for three days later.   That gave us some time to be with George and get used to the idea, but for me it was terrible.  He’d walk around being George, totally oblivious to his fate, trusting eyes asking for food and pets and a walk as usual, even though he had no energy whatsoever.  When we took him in I held his head in my hands, and as he was injected we were nose to nose and the last thing he heard was my usual mushy voice telling him what I always did “you are my little sweetie pie-mst.”

For me the most difficult part was, of course, the whole “time-life-philosophy” thing.  I went back in time – to the day we brought him home.  Our rendezvous spot with the seller was a shopping mall, and with George at 8 weeks old we were the stars of the day.  He couldn’t make it across the street fast enough so we had to pick him up to get to the other side before the light changed.  Everywhere we looked there were smiles.  That’s what a puppy does to people. 

That’s what he did for our family.  Grouchy mommy mornings turned into laughter and joy in our home, with George’s puppy antics taking center stage.  My mother would come to visit and she remembers jumbles of boys and dog careening down the hallway, up and down stairs.  They had a game called the “Elephant Game” and I think it had to do with one of them putting an athletic sock all the way up their arm, with a flopping section at the end with which to play tug of war with George.  I have a zillion photos of boys and dogs crashed out together at the end of the day.

George travelled all over with us in the travel trailer, to Glacier National Park (where the ranger told us to keep him inside the trailer –  he called dogs “bear bait”), to Yellowstone and the Tetons, to the Southwest, and all points in between.  In Canada one of our campgrounds had a roving donkey, who would come up to the trailer screen and he and George would nose each other.  He, too, got into it with a skunk down at the beach in southern California.  Lovely.

George would stand guard when Al had seizures, waiting patiently until they were finished and then nuzzling Al until he would receive a pat on the head, assuring him that Al was ok.  He could do this because as first time dog owners we were foolish enough to let him on the bed as a puppy, so when he was sixty pounds he was still up there.  George was my sleeping buddy on rainy school mornings when I’d drop the kids off and go back to bed for a bit more shut eye. It was like sleeping with a bag of cement.  People move when you nudge them with your knee.  Not dogs.  They magnetize themselves even deeper into the mattress.  We don’t let Ed up on the bed – well, I think the boys do, but that’s their business.

Ten years of George, and then suddenly it was time for him to leave us.  I wondered where the time had gone, my sons from little boys to college men. When Joe went off to college George was truly bummed out.  Joe still is the most playful of all the guys when it comes to dogs – he can outplay any pup, even at the ripe old age of 25.  I guess I should have seen it coming, that our time with George would be limited, but I guess in a way I was in denial that even my family was growing up and out.  Joe wasn’t really going to college.  Jeff wasn’t really 15.  Andy wasn’t ready to graduate from high school.

 George’s life remains as a symbol of our young family’s life – the joys, the tears, the vacations, the naps, the time, the time, the time.  I kicked myself when I accidentally ok’d the separate cremation for George.  Now, the stunning roses that bloom where he is buried in the garden are a constant reminder of him and my youthful family every time I leave the house. It makes me think I will probably do the same for Ed the Dog if money is available for such.  Some things money can’t buy, but some things money can buy, and a beautiful rose in George’s name, easing the sorrow not only of his passing, but of the progression of time, is worth a few hundred bucks to me.