Hektor loved two things dearly, very dearly. One was food…..the other was me.
Hektor trusted one person…..he wanted to trust others but he always held a little back….but with me he trusted. He would do things that made him anxious, go places that were to him a little scary simply because I asked him to.
There is a great honor in being trusted by a dog, any dog, regardless of personality, but there is an awesome honor in being trusted by a dog that is anxious or fearful. The weight of that trust weighs like a stone upon my heart today, the weight of the honor you bestowed upon me, your person, for your final journey.
I saw the anxious look in your eyes as you beheld the veterinarian and her assistant sitting in your living room. I saw the conflict in your eyes as your heart told you, fight or flee……and I know my friend that this was the very hardest thing I had ever ask of you. I had to ask you to be still in the presence of strangers. To ask you to lie quietly on the floor and believe, this one last time that I, the one you trust so, mean only the very best for you.
In the end you left in peace, and though it broke my heart to see you stretched out, knowing what was to come, it was good to see you totally pain free and resting. You haven’t rested well for some time. That anxious look you wear when we go somewhere scary, or do something that you are uncertain of, was a look you began to wear at home all the time. Pain intensifies anxiety.
You are free from pain now my old friend, free from the anxiety of it. You have earned your rest time and time again. Thank you for the years of loyalty and trust. Thank you for all the walks we took. Thank you for all the times you trusted me when things looked so scary. You were always brave. One cannot be brave without the presence of fear. You were always brave. I always felt safe with you beside me when we walked out on the mesa together.
I miss you.
Yesterday I came home, and as the garage door opened I naturally looked for your smiling happy dog face and your great thumping tail…….and there was nothing.
Five PM came and went and there was no reminder that it was dinner time. You always loved breakfast and dinner and you could set the clock by the anxious look on your face if I forgot what time it was.
Yesterday I took Samson out for a walk along the high mesa. I missed your presence terribly. Missed the security of having the big white dog by my side, missed your steadfastness, for as you know, Samson, though beloved is like a flash of energy that never stops. You always loved to walk right beside me, my hand could brush the top of your back as we walked. I miss you.
You will be laid to rest next to Miss Keeter, my “bestest” girl. It is right and fitting that you two rest together. But more importantly you will take your place within my heart, buried there for as long as I have breath and walk this earth……..and I will call you as I walk the mesa, and you can take your place along side Snubby, Charlie, Floppy Bear, Gunnar Goodheart and dear Miss Keeter………until the other side my old friend………I miss you!
“For if the dog be well remembered, if sometimes he leaps through your dreams actual as in life, eyes kindling, questing, asking, laughing, begging, it matters not at all where that dog sleeps at long and at last. On a hill where the wind is unrebuked and the trees are roaring or beside a stream he knew in puppyhood, or somewhere in the flatness of a pasture land, where most exhilarating cattle graze. It is all one to the dog, and all one to you, and nothing is gained, and nothing lost -- if memory lives. But there is one best place to bury a dog. One place that is best of all. If you bury him in this spot, the secret of which you must already have, he will come to you when you call -- come to you over the grim, dim frontiers of death, and down the well-remembered path, and to your side again. And though you call a dozen living dogs to heel they should not growl at him, nor resent his coming, for he is yours and he belongs there. People may scoff at you, who see no lightest blade of grass bent by his footfall, who hear no whimper pitched too fine for mere audition, people who may never really have had a dog. Smile at them then, for you shall know something that is hidden from them, and which is well worth the knowing.
The one best place to bury a good dog is in the heart of his master.
by Ben Hur Lampman
I would like to thank Dr Lauryn Spohn and her office at Pawz To Care - Animal Hospital Bernalillo, for their kindness and compassion. They came to my home and they worked very hard to make sure my boy was comfortable and free of pain and anxiety before he passed. I will be forever grateful for that. My boy was never happy at the vet’s office and it would have been so hard to have him go out there. Thank you! Thank you! For all that you did to see him relaxed and comfortable and to allow him to go out in his home.
Rest in peace Hektor Griego 9/14/2016
Hektor watching us fish.
Hektor waiting on his favorite thing, FOOD!
He spent his last day with me, sleeping on the bed, eating chicken and turkey and ice cream.
I ask my friend to trust me one last time.
“There is a cycle of love and death that shapes the lives of those who choose to travel in the company of animals. It is a cycle unlike any other. To those who have never lived through its turnings and walked its rocky path, our willingness to give our hearts with full knowledge that they will be broken seems incomprehensible. Only we know how small a price we pay for what we receive; our grief, no matter how powerful it may be, is an insufficient measure of the joy we have been given.”
― Suzanne Clothier, Bones Would Rain from the Sky: Deepening Our Relationships with Dogs
Here is an old blog post about one of the many important lessons Hektor taught me.
http://allisgrace.posthaven.com/do-not-be-anxious-dot-dot-dot-lessons-from-a-big-white-dog