Hug your dogs, they leave too soon

She was a throwaway. No one wanted her.

The first time I got the bug to go to visit Animal Services was in July 2001 because of a puppy with rott coloring that they had on their Webcam. I looked at him and then I saw her... She had been left tied to the old Animal Services building - July - Florida - no water. Some passerby called Animal Services and she got there 40 minutes before I arrived. They thought she was a male... I thought she was gorgeous.

I went back the next day to see her on my lunch break and found her to be starved and starved for attention. I guessed then that she was about a year old - recently whelped and if looks can tell - extremely well bred with a breeder-cut tail. I put my name on the list to take her. I was the only one. I named her Pris after the Daryl Hanna character in Blade Runner. It fit.

I got her to be a replacement for Elba and Elba seemed to know that, accepted her as a confidant and tolerated her playfulness - but hung in to make her wait six years and then I made her wait another eight months until I felt I was ready to have another bed dog. Mid July she got promoted.

She got demoted last week because she went off on me, screaming and air snapping as I tried to shoo her off the bed. It was so extreme I went into shock. Then I thought about it and wondered about an on and off iffy limp. I made an appointment to get her into the vet but a few days later because I thought perhaps she had slept wrong and pinched a nerve and would come out of it... Deramaxx took the ouch off. Tweaking muscles happens as you get older. But it didn't get better.

She was diagnosed with osteosarcoma Friday... the X-rays showed the cancer was chewing away at her tibia... The vet said that perhaps she had a greenstick fracture, but it didn't seem to be causing more than discomfort which we could control with drugs until I decided it was time.

I almost sent her on then, but I decided to be selfish and take her home armed with drugs to pamper her as the bed girl she wanted to be - we had a week, I thought.

That changed as I watched the bones in her leg move in an unnatural manner the next day as she was checking out the field and I knew that her tibia had broken. Seeing that and knowing that there is a tropical storm/hurricane on the way and not wanting her to be confined in a VariKennel 500 crate at the kennel under the stress of being separated from me... today I sent her to join my pack at the bridge.

She is the only dog that I have met that would jump up and put her paws on your chest but never put her weight on you. She danced :) We danced often... Someday we will dance again.

My gorgeous rescue, Uitlander's Black Silk Dolly, is gone. I miss her already.