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A Closer Look
Faithful companion will be missed
I’ve always had a tough time saying goodbye.
The usual scene goes something like this. I look at the traveler with misty eyes. A pat on the shoulder or back, then a quick hug follows. A few words of endearment wrap up the farewell, as I turn to leave before the mist in my eyes turns to rain.
I always try to make it as quick and painless as possible. I hate it. I hate thinking about goodbyes. I hate the feelings they bring out.
There was no avoiding this goodbye, though. We’ve seen it coming for a couple of months, now. You could see from the age in her eyes, the gray in her face, and the slowness of her gait, the end was drawing near for our 12-year old liver and white springer spaniel.
A trip to see Dr. Erin Schroeder at Cedar County Veterinary confirmed our suspicions.
Harley has a heart murmur, Dr. Erin told us just before Thanksgiving. That heart murmur, her lack of energy and her lack of appetite all mean the end is drawing near, she told us.
A ton of thoughts have rolled through my mind these last few weeks as I’ve watched her literally deteriorate in front of my eyes.
My mind flooded with fond memories of the lively pup that would beg to play whenever I walked through the door. The willing companion that would gladly go fetch a newspaper off the front boulevard and proudly race back into the house morning after morning to show me what she’d done. And it didn’t matter how much snow was on the ground, either. The greater the challenge, the happier she was.
It wasn’t always this way with Harley, though. When she first arrived in our lives in 2012, she was a five week-old pup that was barely able to walk.
In May, 2012 she was tossed into a Colfax County ditch to die. The way we have it figured, she was born in a puppy mill. Once they figured out she was born with two fused vertebrae, she was no more than damaged goods to them, so she was tossed into that road side ditch to die.
That should have ended her short life, but she had luck on her side. Our oldest son was making his way back to Lincoln that fateful day, when he spotted something in the ditch. He kept driving along, but it kept nagging him, so he turned around, went back and found this tiny, scared little puppy.
At first Harley could only drag her hind legs behind her as she attempted to walk.
Kyle nursed her back to health and worked with her so she could use her legs, although she was never able to run normally. Instead of running through the grass to fetch a ball, she’d hop like a rabbit.
I’m sure every move hurt her, but this dog was one tough cookie. She never showed pain. She never let her inability to run slow her down.
That’s why it was so hard to watch the life slowly slide out of her. Her final days were tough. She knew something was going on with her body, but never being one to complain, she just took it, standing and staring off into space as the fluid in her lungs built up.
I’d look at the gaunt shell Harley had become and think about all those times we wrestled and played together in the living room.
Still, she tried to act like everything was normal — the desire in her heart stronger than the heart itself.
I’ve done a lot of that staring off into space myself lately, anything to keep the memory of that long, sad goodbye in the recesses of my mind.
