Good-bye

by Nobalance

So today was not a good day.

"Chester hasn't come back, do you mind going to check on him," asked my wife, hip jutting to perch our third child Lily and aromatically sipping coffee. And I grumbled my way out into the backyard to have a look. Already assembling the requisite cleaning gear in my mind as I passed it in the garage; hose, bucket, old towel used to clean bike, etc. He's older and slower, 100 pounds of Chesapeake Bay retriever, but he's a retriever and if he's gone wandering - there could only be one purpose, to roll in shit.

I love stories and story tellers; story tellers in the fine Scotch tradition that I experienced formatively while spending time with my Dad's fifteen brothers and sisters and the resultant extended horde. I love to watch people laugh and have cataloged silly stories, barely enhanced with artistic license, and the appropriate faces and gestures so as to be that guy who gets asked to re-tell 'the one about pork-chop again.' And a few of my best I mentally catalog as dead dog stories; a whole series of short anecdotes that have traditionally brought smiles and titters. One about a life-long friend who was once married to a farming family that regularly and spectacularly experienced canine loss (a basset hound that died after eating a frozen roast, a wolf hound driven over by a four year old driving a tractor pulling a haying wagon, a daughter throwing a stick into the river that bisects the farm to watch in horror as her beloved pooch floated to the horizon after said stick - stick and dog never to be seen again - and countless other vehicular and large animal kicking related deaths). I have regaled various groups with a personal account of my first driving girl friend tragically hitting a dog and then screaming maniacally for me to find the dog's family - me traipsing house to house, struggling under the weight until stimulating a scream worthy of a slasher movie from the 11 year old that opened the correct door. Well I can find no humour in today. Chester, who never wanders, wandered today. And he's dead. Struck by a car, I found him on the side of the road.

So many memories and regrets flood my mind today. Chester was a unique dog; a profoundly contradictory animal. A tougher mammal the planet has not seen - at home in the most inclement weather; yet at the same time weirdly fragile, both emotionally and physically. We rescued him at about the age of one (a gift from my in-laws as we moved into a first house - purchased as the last dog from a senile breeder) and he'd obviously been abused. He had many, many demons in that handsome brown head and if you varied his diet by an ounce in volume, or worse changed his food, he was a mess. Truly terrified of strangers, I have never met a more loving Chesapeake to those he bonded with. He had the patience of Job with our children and was my wife's constant shadow.

I had lost him as a riding buddy about two years ago, when it just became apparent that his body couldn't take the running - he was just too sore after a ride. But he had been the perfect trail dog. He loved the woods and water and carved Halifax single track like a pro. To watch him swim was awe inspiring - he seemingly had an extra gear and would appear to come up on plane when he really kicked it in. And for a dog that often had us questioning whether or not he had a brain at all, he could be so smart - learning left and right and responding to bellows of, 'trail,' on downhill sections when you actually had a chance of passing him - he was monstrously fast. And though I missed my riding buddy then I had settled into the idea of caring for him and complaining about how bad he smelled through a long old age. It was not to be.

Routine is shattered and every common occurrence brings a sharp pang of hurt followed by deep sadness and regret. The sound of claws on hardwood - gone; a big boy has a big bark - the house is now way to quiet. When the baby throws food from her highchair Jennifer and I turn to look for Chester for clean-up. Arriving home and being greeted by silence instead of big goofy Ches with that tail-a-waggin is something I just can't imagine getting used to. We've been a busy and growing family for the last number of years and he had to adapt. Jen and I said a hundred times that we had to get him to the woods more often. Lately it seemed we left the house on a regular basis without him. Though mellowed with age he still reacted poorly to crowds and strangers, so he wasn't the dog to take to JT's soccer practice or to the ball field to watch Matt play t-ball. We had become so busy that those simple nights of going to Wrandees and throwing sticks into the lake to watch him swim seemed to be gone. Man, I wish I had yelled, 'Chester,' less over the little things. I wish he still came up on the couch with me - that I didn't banish him to the floor because he wrecked furniture - who gives a shit. And I wish we went on one last ride in the woods. So on Sunday I'll be in the woods on PEI, and I'll stop and sit - probably cry - and remember our dog. I miss you bud. Now go cuddle your dogs and if they go on rides with you - pack up and go. And this time enjoy it in the fullest sense - like it might be the last. One last ride.

Posted by bikergrl at September 27, 2007 06:43 PM

---