My old dog, Boo
I was feeling a little nostalgic today since I got a call from an old friend that didn't know that my old dog, Boo, passed away a little over two years ago now. So I ended up looking at photos I have of him, and I suddenly realized that I could look at them and enjoy them without sobbing. So here's some photos of my old dog, Boo.
This is the only photo I ever got of him where he was looking dignified since he was basically never dignified. IIRC he was watching to see if another icicle would fall off the roof of the neighbor's house...
This is how he normally looked in the snow. He's still a youngster in this one but I can't tell how old. I snapped this photo just before he flopped in his mudpie and rolled around in it...
Here's some of him around 5 months old discovering the glorious joys of dirt...
This is him as a baby doggie having a snooze in his usual sleeping position (the pervert)...
And here he is being startled awake because of that little jingle my camera plays when you turn it on. When he was a baby he had that silly looking tiny collection of white hairs on his chin that looked like a doggie soul patch. They went away as he got older...
Here he is having fallen asleep after trying to beat up Mr. Big Bear (who is absolutely gigantic). He got so pooped out trying to kill the giant bear that he dozed off. If Akitas were bred to hunt bear clearly Boo was a failure at it. LOL!...
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I have my new pup, Sophie, now, but I will have my framed photo of my Tallulah with Santa on the mantle throughout the holidays (and one of me with her n my bedroom)...
It really is impossible to totally let go. I have to think she is watching over my ornery little Sophie and at least curbing a bit of her raw enthusiasm...
loved them all and grieved for them all, but my last one, Beauty, was different. The intensity of our bond was stronger, my friends used to joke that we were soul mates. I think it's because we lived alone for most of her life, we were a pack of two.
This is Beauty, she was a Belgian Sheepdog.
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I got her two months after my previous dog crossed the bridge but with her passing I just feel like I need more time. I know the right dog will find me when I'm ready.
I can still remember habits and quirks of all my dogs too - I also had one that loved TP, would grab the end and unravel it all over the floor, lol. Another would always steal a piece of clean laundry from the basket and run around the room with it, daring me into a game of tug. Happy memories, they are all a part of me, always will be.
She was just stunning.
Do you ever feel just right out of the blue for no reason that she's there and you can even tell what she's doing? I still sometimes get these odd feelings that come from nowhere unexpectedly that suddenly I just feel either Kato or Boo there, and I can tell exactly where they are and what they're doing. It only lasts for a few seconds, but it's so odd. And it's so profound that I can't understand when I look at them why on earth I can't see them.
I know exactly what you mean about the pack of two. With each of my dogs that's what it's always been. Me and him (whichever him was/is at the time) against the world. Yeah, it's really an incredible bond when it's just you and your dog. Their my sons, my very best friends, my family.
Oh, I just remembered this embarrassing quirk that Boo had. When ever a guest came over after greeting them he'd run up to my room, open my underwear drawer, pull out a pair and race back downstairs to present them to the guest. I had to tell people, "oh they're clean, just take it from him and tell him thanks like you really mean it or he's going to want to keep trying to present you with my underwear." To comfort himself when I went to work he'd get a pair of my underwear and just keep it with him, carry it around, sleep on top of it, etc. He had no interest in sniffing or chewing them, he just seemed to like to have a pair with him like a security blanket or something. Crazy how I got so accustomed to his doing that that it wasn't anything to bother thinking about to go rescue a pair of my panties out of his crate where he usually liked to be when I left the house and toss them in the dirty clothes bin. I must have owned at least two dozen pairs of undies then just so I wasn't having to constantly wash them.
Probably even more embarrassing though was that Boo had a fascination with bosoms. The woman that owned his doggie mommy had huge... er.... "frontal portions". When I went to pick him up when he was old enough to leave his dog mommy we sat at her kitchen table for awhile just shooting the breeze so she could have one last cuddle with him before having to say goodbye, and I don't think she noticed, but Boo was nearly lost completely between her boobs, and I had to chew off my tongue to keep from laughing and having to explain why. He always had a fascination with boobs though probably because of her, and he didn't care what size. He used to like to cuddle with me even as an adult for a few minutes while I read a book before going to sleep, and he'd doze off with his mouth clamped on one of my far smaller "frontal portions". Whenever he met someone new that came over he desperately wanted to stuff his head up their shirt just to make sure there were some boobs under there. But the first time he met a man when one of my brothers came over he was astonished to discover he had no boobs! My brother was sitting on the sofa cuddling him and he couldn't figure out why Boo was almost frantically crawling up the inside of his shirt straight up to the neckline (and when he did that it tickled like crazy because of his little snout hairs). Then after searching madly under there while my brother is just dying laughing trying to figure out what on earth he was looking for it suddenly dawned on me that Boo was horrified to find that not all humans have boobs. Then he suddenly yanked his head out from under my brother's t-shirt after his thorough yet hopelessly fruitless quest and looked at him with the most astonished expression that we were just rolling laughing so hard we had to race each other to my only bathroom since we were both about to laugh our bladders loose. After that Boo seemed to grudgingly accept the fact that the whole world was just totally wrong and not everyone had boobs.
Oh my gosh, I almost forgot this one... when one of my other brothers stopped by with my Mom Boo was instantly fascinated by his full beard. He'd never before seen a person so dog-like that they had hair on their face. I was sitting on the floor with my Mom on one end of the sofa and my brother on the other end with Boo sitting in between them after going through the cuddling ritual with both of them, and I was about to call him off the sofa when I noticed that while my brother was going on and on about some story he was totally oblivious to the fact that Boo was a few feet from his face so mystified by his beard that he kept trying to lick the air near the beard since he was uncertain if it was something he wanted to taste test. I looked over at my Mom, and she noticed this, too, and we're both sitting there silently shaking with suppressed laughter wondering when my brother was going to notice that Boo was "air testing" his beard. And that brother true to form remained oblivious since he was so into his story telling until me and my Mom just couldn't stand it anymore and started howling with laughter, and my brother looks at us in turn and says something like "But that wasn't the funny part" referring to whatever story he was telling that my Mom and I had long since tuned out of because of what Boo was doing and which, of course, only made us laugh even harder.
And now I have Yoshi that within only a couple of hours of his first being in my home got all excited when I stepped on the foot peddle of the kitchen trash can and the lid popped up. For weeks he would keep going into the kitchen and repeatedly mash his foot on the peddle and get all giddy that the lid would keep opening and closing. He'd get so thrilled with it that he'd do the funny excited dog dance and then start chasing his tail with glee before going right back to making the trash can lid jump and and down. He still does that occasionally when he feels like giving himself a thrill. Funny thing is though he's never once had the slightest interest in what was actually IN the trash can - he just likes to make the lid jump up and down by mashing his foot on the peddle. I don't think he's done it for a couple of months now, so we're definitely due for some trash can thrills any day now.
your dogs It's amazing how my dogs have made me laugh over the years. And each had his/her unique personality, bringing joy to me in their own special way.
I agree about the pack of two - she was my family and my baby. And, omg, yes I've had those moments when I feel her presence very strongly. And it's not part of a dream when I'm falling asleep or first wake up, it's in the middle of the day when I'm wide awake and doing something. I've actually turned and looked around because the feeling is so strong. It's like I feel her energy near me and then it's gone.
Something else I've noticed - for months and months after she died I would dream of her as she was when she left me, elderly and fragile. But as of just recently she appears young and healthy again in my dreams - she's always running, which was her favorite thing to do. It brings me some comfort to 'see' her that way again.
