Man's Best Friend

I know that I should have been prepared for this...he was 15 years old, lung problems, Lyme disease, athritis...

We put him down tonight because of something completely random and sporadic. He got bloat, which in dogs is very lethal. My brother was home when it happened, and we almost lost him right when he got to the vet. They were able to bring him back but the surgery it would take to save him was just as iffy. He was part of our family...and I guess I just wanted to verbal diarrhea some of my favorite memories of him...

• Running headfirst into a tree in the backyard chasing after a squirrel

• Walking him on a leash around the backyard when we adopted him (he was 2, I was 7) to show him the house. Then my brother and I giving him the grand tour of his new house.
• The way he would curl his upper lip and smile at us when he was really excited.
• How he couldn't run in a straight line...he always looked lopsided
• The way he would purr when you pet him and rub his head on you and the furniture. I used to joke he had species confusion disorder.
• How much it helped having him there when we lost our Golden Retriever
• How he could tell a story with his barks
• How he used to lay under my bed at home
• Such a wuss...would climb into bed with me during thunderstorms, afraid of small dogs and puppies too
• His love for chicken jerky...and how he figured out that if he drank more water, we'd let him out more, and if we let him out more, he'd get more chicken jerky as a reward for coming inside when we called him
• The way he would look carsick in the back seat on long trips
• The doggy ice cream we'd give him on his birthday
• All his little doggy girlfriends in the neighborhood....my boy was a STUDMUFFIN!
• His UMD Terps food bowls, leash, and collar
• His stocking at Christmas, filled with bones. He would get so excited by the smell that he wouldn't know what to do with himself.
• He couldn't swim. He would just walk into the water, and then sit down.
• He didn't like playing with toys but if you got him excited the right way and the right time, he'd chase a tennis ball one time. Then he'd bring it back to you, looking at you like he was saying "What the hell am I supposed to do with this?"
• How he'd knock me over when I'd come home from college to visit, and then try to climb in my lap.
• How he'd come find me when my mom asked "Where's sissy?"
• Curling up at our feet when we watched tv.
• Running and barking in his sleep.
  

It only seems fitting that my last memory of me and my dog are traipsing through the woods together in West Virginia. He loved it up there.

Rest in peace, Hershey Duke. You will be missed, so. fucking. much.