Dogs

It’s been almost four years since my dog Spencer had to be put down. To be clear, I have no regrets about it. I saw it coming, it needed to be done, and I felt blessed that things worked out so I knew the very day it was the right time. I saw letting him go, even if I wasn’t ready for it, as the highest act of love I could show him.

Since then I’ve never seriously thought about getting a new dog, and I honestly have no plans to. This is coming from someone who grew up surrounded by dogs. Outside of one two-year stretch in my early teens, there have always been dogs in my family. Right now there are five of them. But none of them are mine. I love dogs. Dogs are simply the greatest. I love dogs more than I like most people. So why don’t I have one?

Twice in the past week I’ve heard about people I know losing their dogs. One of these I knew well. I can clearly remember how sleek and furry he felt when I would pet him, or how he bounded around the house when chasing his most beloved toy (beloved, because Duck transcended only being a mere favorite), or what his snore was like when he slept, paws up, near my feet on the guest room bed. The other dog was one I’d never met, but it was clear through so many posts and pictures how loved he was by his family.

Reading and thinking about the pain that followed these losses brings back echoes of my grief all too clearly. I had to watch my boy die a prolonged and painful death. The same fear and anxiety from that time will faintly echo back on me now whenever there’s something wrong with any of the dogs in my life. When I was dog-sitting two of them this past fall and one went on an astounding run of vomiting and diarrhea, I wasn’t anywhere near as concerned about all the clean up or my carpeting as I was about how bad he felt and what was wrong. I spent two consecutive weekend mornings sitting in an emergency vet exam room for a total of almost seven hours without thinking twice about it, just because I wanted him to feel better.

I remember reading an interview with Bruce Springsteen long ago when he was discussing themes in his songwriting. He said something about how if you want to feel the joy in life, you have to be willing to accept the pain that always comes with it. From that perspective, I think I’m a coward. After everything that came with watching Spencer’s life end, I must have decided at some point that that particular kind of happiness isn't worth the pain that inevitably concludes it. Because if I ever start wondering that maybe I might perhaps begin to think about possibly considering getting another dog someday, it doesn’t take much to chase that thought away.

I admire the people who can go through that loss and bring a new dog (or dogs) into the family and start over, and I feel they're lucky for all of the good that doing that will add to their lives.  I’m just not sure I’m one of them.