Today is the three year anniversary of our first shelter dog’s passing. Only ten year old, I still haven’t completely adjusted to a world without my Ellie in it. Having Maggie and Lulu help, of course, but I think I gave Ellie a much bigger piece of my heart than I was ready to lose.
Back when I worked at the Daily Leader - the printed version - I would write columns about her all the time and occasionally write columns in “her” voice. I thought that a nice way to mark this day would be to reshare a small piece of one of the earliest columns I’d written about her.
……
Have you ever been woken up out of a deep sleep by the booming bark of a goofy pit bull standing about a foot away from your face?
IT IS loud.
Through subtle bribes involving threats of violence towards many of her favorite toys, Ellie eventually returned to bed and proceeded to stomp around for a good ten minutes as she flared out her blue unicorn blanket – AND YES, MY DOG HAS A BLUE UNICORN BLANKET! – into something that looked nothing at all like a giant wooly bird nest. Then, of course, she ignored the blanket and laid down on my feet.
Is my dog the only one that does that? The weird “let me stomp around on this blanket like an elephant in need of a bathroom break” thing she does? Anyone else? Or is my dog just “special”?
I’m leaning towards special because there is another thing she does that I’m quite sure nothing else has ever done in the history of things being done. My dog will stand on the sofa, shove the top of her head down on the cushion, and then stomp around while chomping her jaws together and making weird gurgling noises. As near as I can tell she seems to be trying to eat her own face or at least determine if it’s possible.
What is the deal with that?
Anyways, where was I? Oh yes, my life and the change one simple thing can introduce. It’s amazing. I’m finding it weirdly comforting to be half-asleep and reach out to scratch a floppy puppy eat right at arms-length. How did I ever get to sleep without that in my life?
Three years on... there are still nights where I wake up and automatically reach behind my knees to scratch an ear that’s no longer there. Neither of my other dogs are chill enough to sleep with us overnight - at least not yet - but maybe if I get lucky Lulu might eventually calm down enough. We’ll see.
This is all just a long winded way to say I still love you Ellie and I hope you and my folks are having fun on the other side. I’ll be there eventually when my chores are through down here… at least I hope so.
Until later…
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