miranadobe
Posted : 2/9/2011 5:20:04 PM
Thanks, Annie, it really does suck.
Patrick was the puppy she says chose her. She had moved to Ohio and was alone (as seems to be the usual for her life.) She decided to go to the local pound - we're talking the kind of dirty, dark, depressing place where dogs are collected when found as strays, dumped as unwanted, etc... Where the animals have a certain number of days before they're euthanized. Patrick was less than 12 hours from euthanasia. He had been found as a stray, eating out of a garbage can, estimated to be about 4 months old. But hadn't been adopted and was out of time.
He's traveled with her all over the world - literally flying in the passenger area of corporate private planes, and in cargo on commercial planes. (He even once got routed to Paris by accident and when he finally got routed correctly to my sister, his crate arrived upside down and him terrified inside - no wonder he hated the flight back from Denver to Seattle this summer.)
Patrick moved w/my sister overseas to Belgium for 3 years, where Henry was adopted from a similar pound and added to the family as company for Patrick. Patrick was once so deathly ill in Belgium that two vets recommended he be euthanized, but my sister knew something else was going on and he recovered. That was 6 years ago. Then my sister and "The Boys" moved back to the States from Belgium. In Seattle, my sister bought a house and had a fence installed around their yard for "the boys". Patrick loves his house and his yard.
After we left Denver, she moved back to her "little house in the valley" this past summer. She keeps saying how thankful she is that Patrick gets to be back at "home" right now, in his final weeks. That he has his house, his yard, his neighborhood walks, all things familiar to him. Thankful that she's not traveling as much as she used to when he was younger, that she has many more hours in the week to spend with him.
Although she won't totally be alone when Patrick passes - because Henry will be there.... it just isn't the same. Patrick is the ROCK. He's been the solid/steady force for 10 years. He's the dog to bury your face in when the tears and stress and difficulties of the day get to you. Henry is too sensitive to handle that. I don't know what she's going to do in the days and weeks after Patrick is gone and his rabbit-soft fur isn't there to catch her tears.