a wOMANS bEST fRIEND

Last night around 9:00 pm I got a call from friend R in a panic.

"J, something's wrong with my dog, he's just lying there in the grass and when he tries to get up , he falls"

"I'll be right there."

Quick as a whip, I ran down to the house and sat there with the dog while she drove to the vet to see if he was there. I kept peeking out and praying upon praying that nothing happens to him while she was out. The dog is old and has had a very good life. He's a 15yr old Chow. He is her child. I didn't want her to come home and see that he passed away in her house (her biggest fear). She came back and told me that she got a hold of the doctor and he'll meet us there. Hubby came down to help us pick him up and get him in the car, I drove (in the dark, no less) and R sat in the back with her doggie in her lap.

We knew it would happen one day. That dog is her life. Once, it got out and ran away. For a week straight, I set my alarm clock around 2:00 am and got the kids up and went driving around looking for him. We went out and put up hundreds of flyers around town and 1 1/2 weeks later, a little girl knew where the doggie was.

The doctor said, "He's nearing the end, and you might want to consider some options."

He said to come back in the morning and he would run some tests. So last night, we let the dog walk around as best as he could out in the front yard and took pictures of him. I couldn't get him to sit up and look up, so she had to do it while I took the pictures. It was dark and the dog is black and she was all in black, so you could imagine that I took some really horrible pics of half cut off heads and bodies. I laid down on the sidewalk and got a really really good picture of him and her. I'm glad we did that.

I called this morning at 9:00 and she was crying and saying that she had to let him go. He was blind, deaf, and had started to get arthritis, and while those problems were already there, it looks as though the liver and kidneys were being affected now. She made the decision on the spot, held him for a bit, and let him go. It was really for the best though and I think she knew it was time.

The wonderful crazy thing was that she had been out of the country for the past five weeks and had just come home Wednesday. I think he waited for her.