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Conversations With A Dead Dog

I talk to my dog.

Always have. Ever since we got her. Many of my friends thought this was a little weird. I'm not talking about "good dog" shit. I mean, I talk to her. About things. About life. About politics (pretty sure she was libertarian). About the Green Bay Packers. About whatever.

I still do.

Even though we put her down a week and a half ago. Today I picked up her ashes. We had a long conversation on the drive back. I'm not sure if it's weirder to talk to a dead dog or to talk to the dead dog's ashes. I think we can agree both are a little strange.

I had intended to drop this small box off at Zoe's. But it felt wrong. Inside the box is an urn. Inside the urn is what's left, physically anyway, of a wonderful little dog. I'm not expecting that we'll dress in robes and light candles and do some strange stylized movements while chanting in Latin or anything like that. It does seem like I shouldn't just let myself in to Zoe's place and leave the box there for her to discover when she comes home. Where, exactly, does one leave such a thing? On her computer (she's sure to see that)? In the middle of the floor, alone and forlorn in the big apartment? On top of the fridge? Nestled comfortably on Zoe's pillow with a blanket tucked around her? The etiquette was beyond me.

That and while I know it' s just a nice package containing ashes of the body that used to house the Finest Dog In All The Land I ain't droppin' my little girl off alone.

Strange what the loss of something you love does to your head...

Loved that little dog. I am, as I imagine I've mentioned here before (but I try not to go reread things I've posted...it's like the lamest form of narcissism ever) this is one of those instances where the word love is a limiter. The ancient Greeks (the modern ones too for all I know) had 26 words for love. Good choice, that. I loved my little dog. I love my brothers. Not the same thing. Same damn word.

Thanks, y'all

Hey, y'all. I don't really have much to say...

...other than thank you. For the comments and the emails, the phone calls, and the face-to-face well wishes and condolences regarding the loss of our little dog.

Really. It means alot.

The Dog Who Lived Forever

Yesterday we put our wonderful dog, Prophet, down. On some level I know she was just a dog. But not to me. She was so much more. I can’t come close to capturing it in words and, honestly, I’d feel a little dumb even trying. The best I can do is to simply say that she was a goddamn good dog. That there is now a tiny whole in the world, so small that no one really notices it. Except for us. For us it’s a huge black void where there used to be such joy.

I want her back. I am greedy. So, greedy, in fact, that I’m conveniently forgetting that we got three more months with her than even the rosiest projection from the doctors. Three months. There were occasional bad days for her when we feared it was time. But she always rallied and went back to being her little doggy self…a little doggy self with a big ass tumor taking over her head…but a happy little dog. And a little dog who made us happy.

We had wondered how we’d know. It turned out it wasn’t so hard. The decline happened fast. Monday was one of those bad days. And Tuesday was worse. Prior to this she’d have that one bad day and then a few weeks of doing fine. And Wednesday was worse still. So, we knew.

Thursday it got bad for me. When I realized that a number of mundane things that I didn’t know I cherished I was now doing for the last time. I’d watch her have little bursts of energy and think…maybe not yet. Maybe we’re jumping the gun. And then I’d see her laboring again…laboring to breathe, her airways so blocked that she can’t lay her head down and get air. Meaning she couldn’t sleep more than about 15 seconds at a time. And realizing that she’ll stay and she’ll keep working so damn hard as long as we let her. And that we needed to stop letting her.

Friday was worse still knowing that we were in the last 24 hours. Knowing that we would no longer have her and knowing that the only reason she was having to spend that time working so hard was because we both wanted every last minute we could get. And knowing that Prophet, as Zoe once put it, can only perceive family and not family, home and not home, pain and not pain, and would continue to put up with the pain for every last breath of home and family she could get. 

Then the moment itself. Prophet with her pack, us petting her and saying nice things and finally, at long last, she didn’t have to work so hard anymore.

Now it’s just the utterly depressing aftermath. Going through the house and finding all the Prophet things…collars and toys and bones and her food bowl and medicines and her little cheesy Christmas collar with the jingle bells on it...the one I so enjoyed seeing her in, hearing her in…all these little mundane things, each taking turns kicking my ass. Every time I think I’ve got the last of them I stumble across another little piece of her and get hammered once again.

And though I’ll leave the specifics alone for now it turned out there was one last lesson I needed to learn from her or through her or however it is that it worked. Another lesson I needed to learn that maddeningly I couldn’t learn without this little dog to teach me. Just one of the many things I’ll miss.

I have a million memories…and endless movie of my time with her. Prophet was there through all the changes in our lives the last eleven years. She helped us both get through the hard times just by being furry and warm and liking us so damn much. And she gave us an awful lot of laughter and good old unbridled fun. All that notwithstanding, there is one scene that plays over and over when I think of my little dog. This is how I’ll remember her…

She is running, flying, with her little butt close to the ground and legs flashing forward. Her head is up, her ears are back, and she has on her furry little face a look of utter bliss as she chews up stride after stride of landscape. A smell distracts her and she stops so suddenly she fishtails and her back end catches up with her front end and she tumbles. But the smell. Oh, the glorious smell. A critter? A decaying log? Fresh mud? So many possibilities and they all must be sniffed…inhaled…thoroughly explored and then, if it is important enough, it must be peed on. Because this is how you claim your empire. 

Behind her, ambling slowly in a slightly different direction, is a woman. She is tall and slender with a rolling-shouldered hip-popping gait. The furry imperialist hears her name called and her head whips around, ears straight up, tongue lolling as she pants. She takes a few frantic steps in the direction of the woman, her one true soul mate, before catching her stride and tearing across the endless yard towards her human, her mama, her pack. As dog draws near, the woman crouches suddenly as if preparing to do battle and the little dog feints and fakes and changes directions while letting out a gleeful yelp and then hauls ass past this woman, both of them laughing. Really. 

The dog pulls up…gallop to trot to canter to walk. She pauses for a second, confused as to which way to turn (so much to explore, so little time) and then hears her favorite sound, that voice again calling her name and does a 180 back towards its source. Less frantic this time she skitters, ears back, towards her mama. She gets there and the woman bends and pets the dog, both this time overtaken with that blissful euphoric look. The dog hears something…wind probably…and is off again to explore and proclaim whatever it is as more territory for her pack of two. 

And on and on they walk and run and laugh and tumble and pet and pant and love. Across the endless unfenced yard. Across the world. Across time. One woman and the dog who lived forever, connected eternally by love.

Blather

Hmm...so...what the hell is goin' on, y'all?

I'm enjoying a few days working from home instead of being on the road. The gig I was working on is in a holding pattern. I'm tangentially involved in a couple of other projects at work, both incredibly cool. Since I'm not clear on what is and is not appropriate to reveal here in the blogosphere I reckon I oughta keep my mouth shut on any particulars until I feel like I've got the lay of the land. Some things are a no-brainer...don't reveal clients names, don't bitch about 'em, don't reveal any trade secrets. Some things are tougher to figure out...like if I write about where I'm spending my time (geographically) and what kind of company I'm working for is it possible for someone to put two and two together? And, I'm working on an internal project, some intellectual capital development that is waaaayyyyyy cool. Not sure if I can reveal it in these nascent stages. So...that was a whole lotta badwidth that said nothing. I guess the long and short of it is the travel grind and the hours are as tough as expected but I'm having fun with the work and, as always, the people...both on the Diamond side and the client side. The only real down side is feeling kinda dumb alot as I relearn the ropes. It's like picking up a basketball after five years and wondering why you don't have all the moves you used to have...'cause you haven't practiced you dumb shit. That and I'm not always clear on how hard I should push for or against things as the consulting team works through stuff. I guess I feel like I gotta get my own game together before I start fucking with others games.

So...I'm hanging at home, probably all week. The Finest Dog In All The Land is snoring in the other room. Today is a draggy day for her. Very low energy. It's very hot and humid so that's part of it but I suspect also rattling around in there is that she's, you know, dying. Yesterday, on the other hand, was a very high energy day. She spent most of it in her yard bounding around like a crazy dog and menacing evil interlopers and chasing critters. She has exceeded expectations in terms of time. We didn't really think she'd still be with us at this point. I imagine we're going to have to make a decision very soon in regards to putting her down. For the time being, though you can definitely see a decline, she's still capable of being a dog...and not just any dog but that magical little dog named Prophet. As long as that holds we'll keep her around. When she is no longer that wonderful furry bundle...well...we'll hug her and pet her and say things in soothing tones and it will be time to let her go.

Until then, I'm going to enjoy these days when I get to hang out with her and getting the distinct pleasure of being lobbied by her for a walk or a play or a nuzzling. Like she's doing right now. So, I guess I gotta go get on with that very enjoyable task.

Prophet

No nicknames. No handles. No pet names for the pet. Just one name. Prophet. My little dog. Our little dog. Zoe's little dog. She is, to my occasional chagrin, more Zoe's dog than mine. I'm petty. I get jealous about that. But when I think of Prophet, when I page through the many memories of this little creature...this furry, panting thing that brings such joy to me...the first thought, the picture, the movie playing in my mind is watching her follow Zoe around, attached at the hip, the heart, the soul.

It's a beautiful picture.

There is still more news to be gotten after Prophet's day of poking and prodding and shots and anesthesia and big scary machines and fear and confusion. Still more news but it's news that only amounts to the difference between awful and really awful. News that is beyond my personal threshold of emotional pain such that I can't any longer distinguish nuance or subtle gradations.

Our little dog is dying. She is remarkably energetic and spry for a dying thing. But she is dying nonetheless. There's a big ass tumor in her nose and it's completely blocked her nasal passage such that she has to breathe through her mouth. It is pressing against the roof of her mouth and up against one of her eyes. It is consuming bone and killing tissue. And it's spreading like fucking kudzu.

At this point our only option, barring some miraculous change in the diagnosis, is chemo. Chemo that will not cure it...that won't even knock it back...but chemo that might, just might, slow the spread.

And there's the bitch of it. I'm all for keeping Prophet around for as long as we can. That cannot, however, mean more time but a loss of that magic energy that is this wondrous dog. If all chemo does is make her hurt and sick so she won't be hurt and sick...well...fuck that. A treatment that gives us a gift of more time with her but gives her nothing but a whole passel of feeling bad and hurtin' ain't a treatment we'll consider. Which means, agonizingly, we'd have to opt for no treatment at all. We'd have to opt, on purpose, to let her die. Which seems inherently wrong.

In some ways we are hoping that Prophet will tell us when she is ready to go. And maybe she will, she is quite an impressive dog. But, I think, more likely is we'll have to conclude on our own when it is time to let her go...when it is time for us to stop being selfish. Prophet, you see, will stay with her pack, protect it, nurture it, and revel in it, for as long as the pack will let her stay. And never complain about the cost to herself.

I would never insult the parent-child bond by equating losing a pet to losing a child. Even I am not so self-involved as to miss the rather massive difference between the two. While it is light years off in magnitude it is similar in some attributes. Zoe and I never had kids. We had a perfect dog named Prophet. And into that shedding, drooling, panting, barking, whining, whinnying, waggling, running, jumping package of perfection we channeled all the parental instincts we could. Hers is the only life we've ever been responsible for and the only life that ever was totally dedicated to and dependent on either of us.

Many years ago, sitting on our sofa in Torrance with Prophet sleeping wedged between us, Zoe looked at her and said, "such a little life". Indeed, it is. And it is ours to protect and love.

So, it's hard. It's very hard. As I know many of you already know and have experienced for yourselves.

Barring aforementioned miraculous change, this will be my last post on the topic until...well...the last post. The final news. In the meantime I'll simply say that I am grateful that Prophet picked us on that day long ago at the animal shelter. Thank you to everyone who has sent kind thoughts our way. I've not responded but please don't take that as indifference. Those of you that know me know by now that I tend to be very public on a general level...with this blog as evidence...but shut myself off on a specific level. I will respond at some point to each of you. Until then, please accept my thanks in this general way and understand that doing my Rik the Island bit is my way of coping, illogical as I'm sure that is.

I'm grateful that I got to experience the joy Prophet brings me.

More than all that, though, I am grateful that I got to witness and experience the joy Prophet brings to Zoe and, just as important, the joy Zoe brings to Prophet. It is truly a sight to behold. For that reason, I will disagree with something that Zoe posted (and it's a post worth reading)...you, Zoe, you were worthy of Prophet. You belong to Prophet. She will, forever, belong to you. And that's a pretty cool thing. 

 

The Finest Dog in All The Land: Bad Day In Vet-Land

Prophet had her initial appointment at the U of M. They x-rayed her and did a bunch of blood work and poked and prodded and generally made her wildly unhappy while trying to assess what's going on with her. She did not enjoy it. She liked it even less when I had to leave her there for a little while.

In the week since I'd seen Prophet last the bump on her snout had grown noticeably. The doc found when checking her out that it had also begun to push down against the roof of her mouth. Whatever it is, it's spreading and doing so with alarming speed. Alarming to me, anyway.

We take her in Monday for a CT scan and a rhinoscopy. The CT scan lets 'em see exactly where it is and what it's impacting. The rhinoscopy let's 'em look at it and biopsy the goddamn thing. It'll take 3-5 days to get the biopsy results back but the CT scan will, along with location, allow them to draw some pretty solid conclusions about what the thing is.

I don't like waiting. The doc was able to glean enough from the examination and all the things that didn't turn up in x-rays and blood work to feel the need to prepare me. She used words like cancer and radiation and other terms that never, ever were supposed to be applied to my little dog. There is still some hope that it is something other than a mass and some hope that even if it is it is not a cancerous mass. But it is a very large hope with a very small probability.

Early Monday morning I'll put the little dog in the car and we'll drive back to the bad place and she'll get frantic and employ all her powers of persuasion to convince me not to take her inside. She will, unknown to her, have a far better chance of convincing me than ever before. And she'll cry and make little scared sounds and look back at me with big scared eyes as they march her down the hall and I stay behind. And I'll go home and work and Zoe will go off to her job and we'll try to concentrate on activities that no longer strike us as meaningful or important, all the while holding out hope that they find some hideous thing, some awful but treatable thing, that doesn't involve words like cancer or radiation or chemo or any other words too ugly to be used in association with the Finest Dog in All The Land.

The Finest Dog in All The Land

Update 5/8 - The Finest Dog in All The Land has an appointment this Friday at the University of Minnesota (she thinks it's to interview to become a student there), which we're told has a fine Vet department.

This here is the Finest Dog in All The Land. She has a variety of names including, but not limited to: Snow Dog (a new one based on this picture); The Furry Assassin; Duchess; Bubba; The Killer Guard Dog; Varmint Killer; Little Dog. All of which aggregates up into the wonderful package called Prophet. Most folks who find themselves under the care of a dog pride themselves on having the best dog in the world. It is strangely heartening and maddening that I know they are all perfectly, completely, undeniably...wrong.

I got to have the little girl dog with me all of last week. I wasn't on the road and Zoe was working and teching and so I got to have Dawg perform in the role of Most Effective Consulting Assistant Ever. Her assistance consists of reminding me that it's nice and sunny outside and, really, we should go play. Or that it's time to give her food...'cause man and dog cannot survive on computing alone. Or that it's a great good time any time you get to pet the dog. As such, much petting should be engaged in. This time, like every time Prophet stays with me, I got depressed when she left with her mama. I hate seeing her go. Hate that I won't get to wake up tomorrow and fix my tea and sit in the backyard sipping it and watching her watch the world. It's a little heartbreak every time she leaves and it takes a day or two to stop expecting her to greet me, all a-waggle and a-whimper, when I walk into the house. However, as much as Prophet likes staying with me (and I'm pretty sure she likes it) she is awful happy when Zoe comes to reclaim her. I'm pretty cool, but ain't nothin' in this world better than mama. The cute factor watching them simply be with each other hits dangerous levels.

The Finest Dog in All The Land is, as I've lamented before, getting old. Her latest malady has both me and her mama worried. She's been getting nose bleeds and is constantly congested...so much so that she sounds like a pug. Or me when I wake up in the morning clogged and hacking from the previous day's smoking. She's got this bump on her snout, something internal. Like a polyp. Or a tumor. We're gonna have to take her off to the UofM, since the antibiotics and the steroids and whatever else the vet throws at her, only temporarily alleviate (when they work) this condition. They're gonna sedate her and stick a scope up her snout and see if they can figure out what the hell is going on. I'm scared. I don't want to find out my little girl is bad sick and we can't do nothing about it. Or worse, that we could have but waited too long.

We're not sure when we'll get the appointment scheduled...when they'll be able to get her in to work their veterinary wonders. But if y'all got some spare good thoughts sittin' on a shelf that you ain't using, maybe you could send them to a furry little girl named Prophet.

Update

Workin', workin', workin', workin', workin'.

But, it ain't all gloom. Because her mama's teching a show that opens this weekend, and between that and work she isn't home alot (crazy busy schedule for Zoe), I got the Killer Guard Dog sittin' next to me functioning as my erstwhile assistant. She's very erstwhile. Very much, indeed. I don't even know what "erstwhile" means but whatever it is, this little dog exudes it. She excels at reminding me when it's time to take a break and has a stress relief program she has put me on. Said program consists of playing with the dog, petting her, and taking her for walks.

Ooops. Apparently I wasn't aware that it is now time for a walk.

See y'all later.

Me, Some Snow, And A Killer Guard Dog

This morning it was rainy and cold and muddy and every where you looked you only saw brown grass, dead leaves and mud.

Four hours later everything is covered in a blanket of fresh snow. The first snow fall is a beautiful thing. Once the precipitation switched over from rain and sleet to snow the Killer Guard Dog and I ventured out.

The first snow fall brings with it a blanket of quiet. The snow seems to dampen sound and folks shut themselves up inside. Eventually these northerners will make their peace with it and embrace it. But the first one of the year they run from.

Prophet and I had the sidewalk, the entire street if we wanted it, to ourselves. My little brindle coated girl was soon looking like a flocked Christmas tree...coated in snow, laminated in it. But her tail was sticking straight up and she had a bounce to her gait as she trotted along hunting whatever it is she hunts along the sidewalks. After a quick couple of blocks we headed to the park and I let her off the leash, something I rarely do unless it's late at night when the place is deserted. But, with the first snow of the season dropping big, wet flakes on the town, the place was empty.

She took off running like she did when she was a puppy. We ran all over that park. Prophet took frequent breaks to stick her nose into drifts and scrutinize some wonderful doggy smell hiding below the surface. And then we played fetch with snowballs, a favorite game of the Killer Guard Dog. She doesn't actually fetch them, in that she cannot be bothered to bring them back on the rare occasion they plop to the ground intact. But she likes it when I throw them high in the air and she can chase 'em and jump up to catch one before it hits the ground. Of course, they explode in her face and she yelps and jumps and wags her tail and crouches down just begging me to toss another. Once I stop laughing I'm only too happy to oblige.

She's lying on the sofa next to me now, snoring. She's gotten old, this little dog. But I know that later tonight she'll be recovered. And there's this park across the street. And there's good wet snow, just perfect for packing up snowballs.

The Killer Guard Dog Saves the World!!!!!

You have no idea, my friends. No idea how close the world as we know it came to ending today. For there was, wandering the streets of South Minnepolis, an evil the likes of which we have never seen before. An evil that would, if left unchecked, destroy us all.

But the Killer Guard Dog saves us.

It started mundane enough. Today it's very Seattle here in Minneapolis. It's been very Seattle for the last week or so while, I hear, Seattle has been terribly Minnesota, what with the snow and all. Here in Minneapolis the temperature has parked a few degrees above freezing and we don't have any snow on the ground. It's a pissy, drizzly Seattle of a day here.

Prophet, the Killer Guard Dog, is hanging with me for the next month. Having grown up in California in a series of houses that had fenced yards she had, at one point, been an indoor-outdoor dog. There was always a door open somewhere and she could come and go as she pleased. We moved to Minnesota and leaving a door open was no longer an option. In the winter this would mean frostbite. In the summer mosquitoes the size of sparrows would flood the house and begin building nests. Still we could just open the back door and let her go frolic in her yard. Then Zoe and I split up and the beastie stayed with her mama (as it should be...Prophet seems to miss me when I'm not around but she gets downright weird without Zoe). The girls moved into an apartment this summer and I moved back into the house. Prophet now gets walked multiple times a day and she's aggressive about lobbying for walk time.

Like she was this morning.

More after the jump...