July 15, 2008

Bear is the white German shepherd that my father got for my mom while I was still young. When daddy brought bear home, you could hold her in both your hands, she was so small. She barely had her eyes open but from the way daddy told it, Bear chose him.

He had gone to see a man about a dog, literally, for mom. At first he wanted a boy dog to help protect mom and us kids, but Bear kept following daddy around. He says that he didn't choose her so much as she chose him.

Bear was always the brightest dog. She wouldn't play much but there were some things that she liked a lot. Like when you placed a blanket or towel over her head and just started playing with her. She would gently bite your through the towel and whine and attack movements. If you put a cookie in one hand and left the other empty then offered her both hands, closed fisted? She almost always was able to choose which hand had the cookie. She'd be a lady about it too and not try to bite your hand off for the cookie, she'd use her paw to indicate which hand the cookie was in.

When we got her, I was just three or four, so she's pretty much been around my entire life. One thing I always found kind of strange was that she hated thunderstorms and would whine and stay next to mom the entire time. She could always feel it coming and go hide in a bathroom or follow mom like a big white furry shadow.

She used to come with us when we went to different states and state parks on the weekend in our airstream. I remember one time when we were at an airstream park, Stephen and Miranda were walking Bear. I wasn't with them, I was somewhere else at the time, but a strange kid came running up to them and Bear instantly started to protect and bark at the kid, nearly bit them.

That's how she was, she would always stay next to mom or us kids, protecting us. She wouldn't bark unless she thought there was a real threat and she didn't like strangers until mom or dad told her it was okay. Generally, she put her body between mom and somone she wasn't familiar with. She was just that way. She was intellegent and protective, just like a mom. Dad used to say she thought of me as a puppy. Whenever someone wasn't sick or not feeling well, she used to do two things - either stay with them or if she thought she was in trouble, she would go into the tub and wait until she was told it was okay.

Then when we moved up here and got Jackie, Bear became a little more playful but by this time, she was already getting up in her years. Nothing bad, she was just older, more sedate. I think I was ten when we got Jackie. Jackie, however, was just a pound puppy who tugged on Bear's ears and Tigger pounced her and everything else. When Bear got tired of taking it, she would take a swipe at Jackie and bring the smaller German Shepherd/Chow mix down but she was always gentle about it like a mom.

Jackie eventually learned to be a little more sedate although she never could figure out how to speak for a cookie or to bark towards the door not away from it. Jackie still barks entirely too much but that's just Jackie. Jackie did learn from Bear, though, and generally sleeps where she can keep an eye on things and make sure there aren't any intruders.

As time passed, things began to get harder for Bear. She would sleep more, her back legs wouldn't support her, her hips started to go bad, she couldn't romp and play with Jackie anymore. This didn't hit quickly and adjusting to it wasn't easy. She would need assistance getting up and down and because of an incident when she was a puppy, we couldn't give her pain medicine. So she would lay there and whine and try to adjust and sleep but she was just in so much pain. Some days were better and she could sometimes get up by herself but time had taken its toll and even with the weight that she had lost, she wasn't getting any better. Her eyes were starting to go and her hearing was almost gone too.

Finally yesterday it got to the point that she could barely keep herself up for a minute or two, for a few dozen steps before her back legs would give out and she'd fall. She couldn't support herself at all barely and not as far as she wanted to go. I stayed with her and tried to make her stand but honestly, she struggled and whined in pain. She just couldn't do it. So that afternoon, during their lunch break, my parents came and took Bear away to the vet. Mom said that it only took them a second, that Bear didn't feel any pain. She said that you could tell that Bear just relaxed and was finally at peace.

In my county, you can't bury your pet but you can have it cremated. Mom and dad are going back on Thursday to pick up the urn and bring it home.

The entire family grieves the loss of one of it's members. You could never ask for a better dog than Bear. We all love and miss you but we're glad you're no longer in any pain.