The One Where I Finally Meet The Grim Reaper

Cassie RIP 1992-2005

I saw death yesterday. For the first time.

Family pets were always taken in by somebody else for their final journey. Our first baby Nikki (German Shepherd/Husky) died while at the vet's office awaiting surgery. Last year I made Roger take my boy poodle Nicky in for his Last Call.

But I could not shirk my duty to Cassie.

Cassie came into my life in 1993. I got a call from my sister telling me that the local Humane Society had just rescued a lot of poodles from an inhumane puppy mill. Would I like one of the poodles? Why yes please, bartender. Hit me up.

I have to look back and laugh at how incredibly naive I was. My new "son", Nicky, was from a breeder--loved, nutured and cherished from the moment he was born. My new "daughter", Cassie, had probably never been handled. She was a year old and had probably already been forced to pump out a litter. Many of her fellow inmates were blind from being inside tiny confined pens inhaling urine/ammonia.

Cassie was jumpy and skittish from the first minute I laid eyes on her. And she never did get over it. She also never did quite get potty training, (as dogs naturally eliminate far away from their living quarters but caged dogs must do so in their living quarters and they are notoriously difficult to retrain), and my floors are the worse for it.

She loved and bonded with us though, and I was fiercely devoted to her. Beautiful, healthy, energetic, and most of all--smart. Not that I'm a judge of animal I.Q., but my son Nicky was definitely a Bubba type--hey, life is good, fetch me a beer, woman. Cassie was bright. She thought about things and reasoned things out.

Yes, I am one of those tiresome people who feel that dogs are just small furry humans. Wanna make something of it?

In something of a cosmic irony, my boy--from a top breeder--was the weakest, sickliest dog you can possibly imagine. My girl--from the worst of the worst backgrounds--was radiantly healthy.

I have not mentioned her on this site because lately I've just been deeply depressed about her health. It's a long and tiresome story, but she's been quite ill for the past year. She had lost much weight and stopped eating. She could barely walk.

I knew that it was time. And I knew that I could not run from this. I was the one person in the world that she loved and trusted without reservation. I had to be with her to the end. I owed her that much.

I took her to the vet yesterday. He's a really good friend. He discussed several alternatives with me that might help her hang on a little longer, but I felt that she was telling me that she was tired of living in pain. I told him to do it.

He attempted to distract me with conversation as the needle went in. She did not fight it. I don't think she was even there--I think her spirit had already started to fly. Down she went. Just immediately.

I began to sob uncontrollably and he left us alone together for as long as I needed.

I called the girls' school and sobbed that I would be a little late in picking them up. I carefully examined her body. So thin, so weak, sunken ribs. I knew that I had done the right thing. Her eyes were dim. She was such a shell of the gorgeous little dog I remembered. I had never touched a dead body before. I did. She was still warm.

Now I wait, and wait, flinging entreaties up to the skies above that one day we will be reunited.