puppy, consider this my eulogy

My family dog, Zoe, died in her sleep on Monday.  We knew she was getting old, and we actually kind of knew that night something was going on.  That's how much we know this little puppy of ours.  She would have been in our family for 12 years coming this August. 

We are not weird dog people that treated our dog like a person.    

Well, maybe at Lake Powell we did when she wanted to go knee-boarding.  That was just funny though.

She was obsessed with Lake Powell.  My Dad hated taking her, but we all loved it.  She was the best little swimmer and got bugged when we were in the lake and she wasn't.  She would bark, bark, bark until we would throw her in; my dad thought that was pretty fun.

She loved chasing lizards with my brother.  She was quite good at it.  When she would catch one, she would chew on the poor little guys to brake their bones; her Irish dog ancestry of catching mice kicking in.  Those lizards were goners with the hunting crew of Zoe and Tyler.

She would run so much on the hot rock, that we had to get her little booties so her paws wouldn't rub off.  

She hated when we would leave a beach.  We would all get in the boat and yell to her to come.  She never would. So we would pull the boat out of the beach and head out.  She would see us wave and say bye, she would start to whine, hop in the lake and swim out to us.  We knew all along she couldn't let us go.  

She never needed this doggy life jacket.  We just thought it was funny.

She was such a good puppy.  We all loved her.  Even my dad did, even though he would hide it.  He had a soft spot for her.  He hated when Zoe would come and snuggle up to him on the couch, or lay on his feet while he was cooking in the kitchen.  But Zoe just loved him, probably more so since she knew she had to continually work at it his love.

  

All dogs have their own little perks, and Zoe was full of them.  She loved on Sunday nights when we would pop popcorn.  She would just wait and wait under that popcorn maker for my dad to throw her some popcorn.  But she would have none of the un-buttered or un-salted pieces.  If you threw her a plain piece of popcorn, she wouldn't eat it.  She knew what the good stuff tasted like.  And she would hold out.

From what I remember in my little years, I didn't have a dog.  I always felt so left out from the world because we weren't dog people.  I thought we were a weird family because we didn't have a dog; even though I had plenty of other pets growing up.  But, to me, the dog was the ultimate pet. 

And then one day my dad brought home Zoe.  I could not believe it.  We were dog people! My family had a dog!  Oh she was such a cute little puppy.  We were obsessed.

That first day we had her, I was laying on the ground and I started to stretch with my blanket all wrapped around me (whats new...) and when I lifted that arm up, she snuck right in and and started to snuggle with me.  That was the moment I started to love her.

She had a rough little go with my dad in the beginning, he threatened to sell her many times growing up.  We even had a family picked out that came over to our house to play with her.  All us kids sat around and watched this annoying four year old bug the heck out of Zoe.  Once they left, we all decided (sans dad) that she could not leave us and go to that family.  Zoe hated that kid and we could tell.

So we would hide certain things from my dad... like when she ripped up a whole line of carpet in the family room.  We called the carpet guy that day, and had him fix it before my dad got home.  Good as knew.

We loved pulling the fake poop joke, especially on my dad.  The day we got the fake poop, we put it on the carpet right next to my dad's side of the bed.  Oh you should have seen him when he saw that!  He was furious.  And then he got grossed out when we picked it up for him, bare hands and all.

My dad had to bury her.  I am so glad I didn't have to do that.  My dad knew he couldn't just give her to animal control for them to throw in the back of their car; he knew we wouldn't like that.  So he buried her in the backyard.  

That may sound like we are weird, but I think it is sweet.  She was our childhood friend.  She grew up with us.  

We all love you puppy of ours.

Consider this my eulogy to you.