For Him.

About six months ago, I turned and looked at Bax, our beagle mix, and realized that our time with him was drawing to a close.  The years had weathered him, although he never lost his youthfulness in his eyes.  His muzzle was gray, and the black floppy silk ears were speckled with white.  After losing Bos just six months prior, the notion that we would lose him sooner than later, filled me with a sense of dread. 

And even with my the heaviness in my heart and gut, I was still amazed at the absolute joy it brought me to watch him be the dog that my kids had known for their whole lives.  Even in his final season, his quest was simple:  love, love, and love some more. 

On a spring day in 2000, I waited out back for my Mom to pull up and take me to have my wisdom teeth removed.  Needless to say, it wasn’t a carefree day, and to top it off, I was still healing from the loss of our first pregnancy just a few weeks before.  As I sat down on the back porch steps, I heard the sound of a chain dragging against the sidewalk.  As I stood up to investigate the sound, a beautiful black and white dog came happily up to me with the chain still around her neck.  And along with that chain, came the most beautiful, fat puppy I’ve ever seen.  He was still nursing, although it looked like his Mama would have preferred otherwise.  About that time, my mom pulled up and noticed my visitors.  We thought for sure someone had to be looking for them, so we loaded them into the car and canvassed the neighborhood.  Although we came up short, we made the decision that they would ride in the car to the dentist’s office, and that we would have a better idea of what to do with them when I was looped up on pain killers.  Needless to say, Macey, and her baby, Baxter, became part of the Thorne family the minute they walked up onto our porch.

Baxter was a baby in every conceivable way.  For a full 24 hours after his first set of shots, he whimpered and whined as if someone was stabbing him in the injection site.  If he couldn’t see us in the house, he tore through it like a crazed maniac – tearing up pretty much anything in his wake.  He would howl at all hours of the night, and we didn’t have an intact venetian blind to be found.  At one point, the Vet put him on doggy Prozac to calm his nerves a bit.  But all the while, he was our baby.  And, during the time he went from a pup to a dog, I was pregnant with Sam.  From the minute I found out I was pregnant, Baxter never left my side.  When my belly was gigantic, he would still manage to carve out a space on my lap in the recliner.  While in the hospital for Sam’s birth, BJ had blown up a giant photo of the dogs for me to concentrate on during labor, and it helped immensely. 

So, it was no surprise at all that the moment we walked in with a new baby, Baxter made his way over to him, gently stuck his nose in every possible space in the car seat and breathed him in.  From that moment, he became his dog.  Oh, he loved me still, but his ultimate life plan was to be the best snuggle bug that any kid could ask for.

With every kid we brought home – and you know that’s quite a few in our abode – Bax did the same thing.  He’d smell them, roll on their blankets, and claim them as his own.  When one of them was sick, you would find Bax curled up with them on the couch – keeping watch as he kept them warm.  Not one time did he EVER act anything but loving to them when we didn’t get to them in time to stop them from pulling his hair, or poking his eye.  He was the most gentle, loving being I’ve ever witnessed with children. 

About two weeks ago, I noticed that he wasn’t eating.  He’d still take food out of our hands if we offered it, but he stopped with the dog food completely.  About a week after that, he became so weak that he could barely get up and down our porch steps.  My sense of dread became overwhelming at that point, as I realized that his end was indeed, near.

On Saturday morning, we awoke to a frail, shadow of the dog that Bax had been.  He couldn’t stand on his own, and when we would take him out, he would collapse in the yard as if he was giving up.  I knew what we had to do, and I told the kids to love him until they could give no more, and prepare themselves for the hardest thing a human can do for their beloved furry family.

His doctor said that he was in acute kidney failure.  She gave him some IV fluids, a shot of pain meds, and sent him home to spend some time with the family who loved him beyond reason.  I sat and held him in my arms until all of the kids came home.  I explained the situation, and told them how sorry I was that it was at this point.  All of them, in their own hysterical, jaded, and beautiful way, told him how much he meant to them, and they thanked him for being this beautiful creature who had kept them safe and warm.  Carrying him to the car for his final ride, was honestly the most gut-wrenching thing I’ve done.  Bos was loved by all of us, but he was MY dog.  Bax was an unrelenting angel to my babies, and their pain was almost too much to bear.

Doc Shroeder gave him an injection to relax him and calm him, and BJ and I spent the better part of ten minutes  gently rubbing his head and telling him how much we loved him.  When he closed his eyes in peaceful slumber, we were the last faces he saw – the last voices he heard – the last humans he smelled – and we thanked him, a million times over, for being what he was to our kids.

He wasn’t a dog.  He wasn’t a man.  He was a selfless being that showed more love and gratitude in his thirteen years on this earth, than I could hope to in a lifetime.   Although our hearts are heavy, and we miss him more than it seems possible, we know that he is happy, and he is where all dogs go:  Heaven.

Batty Beagle – you were, are, and will always be, our family.  Our lives are better for having had you in them.  Though your time on this earth was relatively short, you taught us more about what it is to love selflessly than we could ever meausure.  Run, Bax, fast and furiously, and know that we will await the day that we meet again, and we will talk of our adventures. We love you, Sweet Angel Dog, now and forever.