I said goodbye to my dog ...

I said goodbye to my dog a couple of weeks ago. She was a good one. I used to call her an almost pure bred Husky. We met back in 79 when we were both puppies, although she was a little younger than me. I was living over on J St. in a house next to an apartment that was another house converted to take advantage of the college students that would come and go during the year. Well, one couple living there at the time decided they was gonna breed dogs and sell em for the money, which seemed like a good idea I suppose. The only hitch was they hadn't figured far enough into the future; so they was stuck with a bunch of barking and hollering puppies at the ends of short ropes tied to a tree in the back yard. Time went by and some of them began to disappear. One day you'd see them all there; the next one would be gone. I never really saw anyone come to get them. In fact I began to suspect they was killing em in the night and eating em or dragging em off to god knows where. By the time there was two left I had decided I could take on the human responsibility of owning a dog so I began to build a house in the corner of the yard. I built it out of oak pallets with nothing but a hammer a saw and a chisel to carve some sort of decoration into the thing. It took two days of hard work. When I was done I stood at the edge of the yard looking over to where the two remaining puppies were tied up just watch. Trying to decide just exactly which one I was gonna keep from disappearing. As I said I stood at the edge of the yard watching. She turned to me and I swear began to smile. If you're familiar with this breed of dog you'll understand what I mean by this as the markings on their faces seem to create another face. A spirit face meant to reveal the inner being of the thing if you understand my meaning. I remember at the time thinking that two faced dogs are hard to come by and judging by her spirit face she might be the one to give a name to. I picked Haida. I began by whispering the name in her direction. I figured if it was her she'd say something back and that would seal the deal. Well as I said she was smiling in my direction and when she heard me speak her name the look of understanding came over her face and she began bouncing up and down and back and forth at the virtual end of her rope. Then she stops to face me and lowers her head down so I could see her other face in its entirety and began talking to me in the softest, sweetest little voice I ever heard. "A hooo wooo wooo." Now the words didn't mean much to me but the way she was saying them went to my heart like an arrow. That was twenty two years ago and I hear that's a long time for a dog. Well it’s a long time for a human too I guess. We've been friends almost the whole time I guess. We never really sat down to talk about it. I miss her ...

 

(Author unknown)