I've been blogging now for 15 years, sometimes for my sake (gotta get the words out!), other times to share a thought about faith or parenting, and most of the time to preserve our family history. The landscape of my blogging habits have changed as the years have passed -- I no longer can write about all the funny things my kids say (they still say them, but now they'd rather not share them with the whole universe). I don't know what the future of this little corner will be, but I may now and then still share my thoughts and heart here, as I will do today, about our little pupper, Shadow.
I've blogged about Shadow here and here and here and scores of other times. But this post isn't quite as silly or tongue-in-cheek about our furry family member. A little over a week ago, quite unexpectedly, we had to put Shadow down. While we are very thankful he is no longer in pain, we are missing him quite a bit around here. Our house just isn't quite the same. A few things we're missing about our pupper doggo:
- Our dishwasher pre-wash cycle. Shadow very kindly and thoughtfully pre-washed all of our dishes as I loaded them into the dishwasher. Now that he's gone, we have to hope the dishwasher can handle the food remains on its own.
- And in the dishwasher category, every time I put the dishwasher detergent in, I opened the under-sink cabinet. This cabinet was SHADOW'S cabinet. No matter where he was in the house, I swear he had a sixth sense about it and would make a beeline to me to receive his due for someone opening the cabinet -- a treat. He basically got a treat every time I opened that cabinet.
- Sharky Shadow! Shadow had a very bad habit of counter-surfing (see below for things we aren't missing in his absence), and when we would eat dinner at the dining room table, Shadow would lurk about, his nose sniffing the air next to the table, hoping to pounce on whatever was on someone's plate. From across the table, only his black snout could be seen, bobbing up and down like a shark's fin. While it was a naughty habit, it always made us laugh.
- Kangaroo Shadow! Whenever we would come home, Shadow was EUPHORIC at our arrival. He was wild with delight and bounced up and down, jumping quite high, causing us to nick name him kangaroo boy. Sometimes he would try so hard to be good and sit for a minute, but after a sec, the excitement would get the better of him and he would be jumping up and down again until you put all your stuff down and petted and loved him. Now when we come home, its quiet and no one seems interested in jumping up and down at my arrival.
- Playing bally! Shadow looooooved his tennis balls and we have roughly 75 rolling around our house. He would lovingly lick the furry thing as if it were precious, and if you threw the ball he'd run to get it, sliding all over the hardwoods. He never seemed to learn how to play fetch though -- he was notorious for bringing it almost back to you, but not quite. He liked to play hard to get and made you work at it to get it back. My husband was his primary playmate. The other thing about his tennis balls is that no matter how many balls were near him, if one was under the couch (or a bed or a dresser), that was the ONLY ball for him. He would bark and bark until someone finally retrieved it for him. Then he'd happily lick it for about five seconds and then lay down next to it.
- Allllll the love. I have often said that no one loved me like that dog loved me. I seemed to be his person (though he loved everyone), and if I was gone, he'd sit at the dining room window waiting for me to return, or look out my bedroom window and whimper. He followed me around literally always -- and I always knew he was up to no good (chewing a sock or toy or pen) if he wasn't under my feet. Since he passed, I look for him countless times a day - he was never far from me for long.
