Today I was touched deeply by two dogs. The first one, is my dog Bandit. He is now 16 years old and quite the "old man". I really didn't think he'd live past 15, but he's still here at age 16. He can't see or hear very well, and his mobility is definitely starting to suffer. His back legs just give in on him many times throughout the day. Most of the time, he just stops walking and slowly his back end descends to the ground.
When he's not lying down wherever his legs stopped working, he's walking in circles throughout the house. Around and around he goes through the kitchen, down the hall, through the computer room and back to the kitchen. He walks a lot farther than I probably do when I hike. Lately, he's been walking slower and descending to the floor more often because of his legs.
We carry him up and down our back steps when he has to go outside. A lot of times when he's outside he'll stop to eat the birdseed left on the ground, we discourage him from doing that but maybe he thinks he's a "bird dog:". We have quite a bit of wet muddy spots in our yard too, and being as old as he is he doesn't seem to see them or care that he's knee deep in mud.
Today was a beautiful sunny day, so we left the dogs outside to soak up some sun. I went out after a while to bring them in, knowing I would have to lift up Bandit and carry him in. I didn't see him at first, but then I spotted him laying in a mud puddle. I guess that's where his back legs decided to give out on him and Bandit was laying in mud.
It really broke my heart to see my sweet old man sitting so undignified in a mud puddle. He's too fine of a pooch to have sunk to such a sight. It really made me sad. As I find myself doing so often lately, I approached him looking at his side watching for the rise and fall of his chest. Yes, he was still breathing! I picked him up and he lay limp in my arms. He's fine as he'll ever be at 16, but I felt he may have been embarrassed laying in a mud puddle.
My sweet little pooch, we'll go out together from now on, I don't want to find you like that ever again.
My other encounter, happened at church today. With the time change coming tonight, we decided to go to Mass at 5 pm. We can sleep in on Sunday and not miss that extra hour of sleep tonight.
Our parish is blessed with a young woman, I guess she is about 19 or 20 who is blind and is a cantor. I don't know her name, but I admire her voice and her courage to get up on the altar and not only sing, but to have to go up their blind. She has an awesome voice. She usually goes up on the altar with the aid of a cane, but today she had a different aide to help her....a service dog!
He/she was a beautiful black lab. I choked up as soon as I saw the dog. The young woman got the dog to sit quietly at her feet while she waited in a chair to sing. When it was her time to be at the ambo and sing, she got the dog to get up and walk her to the ambo and then to once again lay at her feet quietly. I don't know who made me choke up more, the young woman or the dog! I was so proud of them both! I just loved seeing the dog in church, it made me realize that God's creatures even have a place inside such a sacred place and in our lives as well.
What an emotional canine day it's been!
1 comment:
i teared up at your story of your little boy, having collapsed into the mud. i lost my 14 y.o. yellow lab just last fall. i know that 'checking for breathing and that all is well' mode very well as pets age.
i am happy the young lady has a wonderful service dog to aid her! the folks who raise and train these dogs are incredibly special people...
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