Goodbye to our old boy, Speedy. Our 15-year-old basset hound had a good run. We got him in November of 1999 as a puppy, so for nearly all of our marriage, weve had a dog. He was heavily bonded to Fred, who is taking this so hard. Over the years of having to replace a houseful of flooring due to his refusal to completely housebreak, locks and gates on everything, the ingestion of loaves of break, whole packages or oreos, pies, wallets, photo albums, bags of chocolate covered peanuts, and having survived all that, this past year or so saw him go almost completely deaf, develop debilitating arthritis so bad in his back and hips that his tail was no longer in the center where it belonged. His vision had gone very bad and he had become almost completely incontinent. He suffered from skin problems all his life, and had also, early on, developed a tendency towards cysts and benign tumors all over his body. And my God, was that boy a barker. His last few months were spent pacing the house endlessly, toenails clicking for hours on end. So we let him soldier on until his 15th birthday, which was August 10. And yesterday, we let him cross the Rainbow Bridge, where hopefully, hes again young, mischievous and healthy as a pup. Speedy, I hope your new world is full of sunshine and youth and squeaky balls. I hope you know how hard it was to let you go, and how creepy it was here last night without all the toenail clicking, and again this morning without you barking from the deck. May all your future baths be in sunshine and soft rain drops, and may your sweet soul be at peace.
Posted on: Wed, 20 Aug 2014 13:40:34 +0000