The story you are about to read is approximately 9,000 words or a 45-50 minutes read. If you’ve ever loved an animal, and one you consider family as I did with my dog, I think you’ll find it well worth your time. It should likely be approached as a mini-book more than an essay.
This story is best read with your loving pet right next to you or with the memory of your departed fuzzball top of mind. Thank you for allowing me to share with you the story of a dog that had my heart.
I once had a shadow. She wasn’t as tall as me. She had four legs, a black and white coat, and docked tail — her name was Motzie. She followed me everywhere. Always at my heels. Around the house. In the back yard. Down nature trails. Through freshly cut fields.
Her shadow was cast on sidewalks. On neighborhood streets. She’d wrap her body around my head on the pillow at night when I’d fall fast asleep.
I’d wake up in the morning with a crick in my neck and she’d still be there, above my head, sawing logs. But no sooner than I’d get out of bed, she’d fall in line right behind me before darting past in the hallway and down the stairs. Clack, clack, clack went her nails against the wood as she descended. It sounded like a herd of elephants inside our house. Whoa whoa whoaing in her trademark bark all the way down.
Like she was saying, “Okay, guys! Brand new day. Time for breakfast. Let’s do this. Where’s breakfast? Someone feed me breakfast.”
After she’d eat her food, she had a habit of bringing us her bowl to let us know she was finished and was ready for dessert. It was hilarious because no matter where you were, she would find you. I’d get up from where I was seated and walk over to the closet where her treats were stored and we’d trade: her bowl for the Milkbone in my hand.
That dog had my heart. The sheer amount of grief I’m experiencing at her departure is overwhelming. When my dad died on her first birthday, on May 21, 2009, I became a cryer. My dad’s death softened me up. The perspective of love and loss came at me full force. And what I’m finding in her death, and her life which has always been a bridge to my dad in ways, is I’m struggling.
Mightily.
I know it takes time. I know this heartache, this pit that runs deep in my stomach, will move forward. It’s an animal, right? A pet. No. She was family. A pet is never just a pet. Motzie was an integral member of our family, and as cliche as it may be, my best friend. Sometimes she felt like my only friend these past sixteen-going-on-seventeen years of my life.
If that sounds like a sad commentary on my inability to establish friendships in adulthood, then so be it. When I was down, she lifted me up.
Motzie was always there. A fuzzball of unconditional love. I’d see it in her wagging nub of a docked tail when I walked through the front door.
Rub the belly. Pat the head.
Rub the belly. Pat the head.
I knew her time was coming. I thought I’d prepared myself. I started talking about it occasionally as a way to soften the blow. That I’d accepted it. I used to joke that she would live forever. I said this because I wanted her to live forever. I couldn’t bear the thought of her not being around anymore.
Once my kids left the house for school this morning, I bawled my eyes out. I said things aloud I felt I needed to say. I talked to her. I told her how much I missed her. How much I loved her.
I apologized for getting frustrated with her when she’d have accidents her last year of life. She was always good about not having any accidents. Never a single one in her first 15 years on this earth except for vomiting in the backseat on car rides home in her puppy days.
But her age, and the condition I’d come to believe she had, made incontinence a new normal we’d have to navigate with her. She didn’t want to have accidents. You could tell she was embarrassed by it. Usually the accidents weren’t so much from not being able to hold it, but from the separation anxiety she’d experience. She’d get herself worked up about being alone in the house when we went somewhere that she’d use the bathroom.
She didn’t like being alone as she grew older. Oh, how I understand that feeling right now.
I spent many mornings cleaning up after her when I returned from dropping off the kids at school. It wasn’t easy. Over time, I realized my frustration was pointless. It didn’t help matters. I tried to reframe it.
I loved that dog so much and she’d given me so much love in return that she deserved the best care we as a family could provide. That I could provide when I was alone with her — just the two of us.
When we’d pull into the driveway, returning from wherever we’d been, we had a motto: All hands on deck.
Today, Monday, December 2, is the first day I’ve been alone in the house since she passed. My wife and kids are at school and it’s just me, an empty house, and a gnawing feeling in my stomach.
It’s been a long time since I’ve been alone in a house. I started working from home in 2014. For the past ten years, Motzie has been by my side, every day. Every single day.
And save for family vacations, she’s always been a daily mainstay in my life since my wife (then girlfriend) first brought her home from Danville as a puppy in 2008. The two of us had recently moved in together. A few weeks before, Allison and I had made the trip to Danville to pick her out in the litter.
She was the only girl. The smallest of the litter. The runt.
I knew which puppy I wanted from the moment I laid eyes on her. My wife felt the same as she held her in her arms and talked baby-talk to her.
Now there were three of us.
Then there were four.
Then five.
Now, four again.
The thing about family vacations for me is I didn’t like leaving Motzie behind. After a few days, I was ready to get home. I know that sounds in ways like I didn’t enjoy our vacations.
Over the years, my wife has even joked that I loved Motzie more than her or the kids.
That wasn’t the case. It was just a different kind of love.
Nor was it true I didn’t enjoy our family vacations. I did.
But I didn’t like being apart from Motzie long. Not because I didn’t think she was doing well hanging out with her grandma in Phenix, Ghee.
I just missed her. Wanted to see her. Wanted, maybe even ‘needed’ is the word, to lay my head on her side and feel her fur against my face. Feel her breath going in and out of her lungs as my head moved up and down with the rhythm.
Pure love.
I’ve always been an animal lover.
I used to think I was primarily a cat person until Motzie entered my life. I’d had a cat growing up named Gus who lived 23 years. Because of my attachment to her and her subsequent death, I couldn’t bring myself to get another cat.
A dog it is.
During Motzie’s last few months of life, we bought a large expandable doggie playpen for her to rest in when we were away. It would allow her freedom to move around a great deal but also stay safe. Our hardwood floors downstairs and the tile flooring in the kitchen made it more difficult for her to maintain her balance. Her front legs still worked well, but she’d get to slipping and sliding with her back legs. I bought her non-slip socks and boots which helped.
For the past year and a half, I’ve slept downstairs with her. I set up a bed in what used to be a small spare room off the living room and kitchen. She’d always slept upstairs with us her entire life, on my head or my wife’s head, but she could no longer navigate the stairs safely and we were concerned if she slept in our bed she’d hurt herself if she tried to jump down at night while we were asleep.
The last few months we came to understand how dog dementia operates. Sundowners is the correct term for what she experienced. During the day, she was fine. But come 10 PM she’d rouse awake and become restless. She’d start barking for no explainable reason. Her internal clock didn’t line up with her circadian rhythm and she would become confused and disoriented.
It wasn’t easy for her or us.
We tried lights on, then lights off, melatonin, calming chews, walks later in the evening to tire her. Nothing seemed to work. As soon as 10 PM came around, she’d go into this state.
My wife and I started taking shifts.
If anyone knows me, they’ll know I could sleep through a train running through the middle of my house. So I took the early shift. I’d stay awake as long as I could, usually till around midnight, and get her calm and back to sleep.
She’d inevitably wake up around 2 or 3 AM. That’s when my wife would come downstairs and help get her settled.
In ways, we were zombies walking. Sleep deprived.
The last two weeks of her life the sundowners lessened. A few nights she slept all the way through as she once had. Other nights, she’d wake at 4 AM. But that wasn’t too bad from our perspective considering what the previous months had been like.
The first signs of dementia weren’t as obvious. We thought it was just another odd quirk she’d picked up. Instead of walking to the back patio door to be let out, she’d walk over to a corner in our kitchen and stare absentmindedly as if the corner was the patio door.
One day while on a walk, as she was running around in circles like a maniac, her usual routine, the retractable leash caught and shot out of my hands. It was a bitter cold January morning. I knew her hearing wasn’t as good as it once was and that her sight likely wasn’t as clear as in her youth. But I didn’t realize how bad.
I called to her.
“Stop, Motzie! Stop!”
I thought for sure she was going to run toward the road which was at the top of the hill. Cars were buzzing by as this scene played out.
She can’t live this long and then get hit by a car, I remember thinking.
But she didn’t head toward the road. Instead, she bolted down the hill and toward the lake which was partially frozen. I chased behind her, calling her name over and over. Then she splashed into the ice cold lake. I jumped in behind her grabbing her up and paddling us back to the bank.
Freezing cold and soaking wet, we walked home. I dried her off in a towel then wrapped her in a blanket, took off all my wet clothes and shoes, and the two of us hunkered down in front of the space heater for the next hour.
When she crashed into the lake at full speed, I don’t think she had any idea it was water before her.
I texted Allison: “I don’t think she knew she was running toward water.”
Over the past year, I’ve been somewhat self-conscious about how Motzie was perceived by my neighbors. Not all. But certain neighbors who I don’t care for because I know them as gossipy. That’s another story for another day and involves my son.
I told Allison they probably wonder why we haven’t put her down. They see me carrying her in my arms. They’ve seen how she struggles on inclines. Our front and backyard was a terrible environment for her at this late stage in her life. Everywhere you turn a slope.
Motzie needed level ground and every day I’d carry her in my arms to it.
To them, she may have looked pitiful. But she wasn’t, nor was she in pain. That’s the thing about the condition she had. It isn’t until the condition comes for their breathing that it’s painful or even fatal.
My wife assured me no one is thinking what I thought they were thinking. And while I don’t know if that’s true, I had a different perspective of my dog regardless. Motzie was still a big eater. She never refused food. She still drank plenty of water and had regular bowel movements.
Was her vision pristine? No, but she was far from blind. She could make out shapes. She knew where we were. But it was likely blurry just as the lake didn’t appear to be a lake before her, but solid ground.
Was her hearing impeccable? Absolutely not. But what I learned was she could pick up certain sounds, so I adjusted how I called to her. Instead of calling out her name, I’d whistle or make a clicking sound with the side of my mouth.
She’d get frustrated about her inability to walk initially. I could see it. But then she’d muster up the strength to get going, and she was off to the races.
Because of her age alone, Allison and I had the discussion we didn’t necessarily want to have months ago: putting her down. And, at that time, we both concluded it didn’t seem right. If anything, it felt the opposite. It felt wrong and would be pretty messed up if we went through with it.
Nor would we have been able to go through with it then.
There were inconveniences, but no more than caring for an elderly person.
If an old person has trouble walking or needs help with incontinence, we don’t call up the spirit of Dr. Kevorkian. We become caretakers.
And the thing about it, and it may be hard for someone outside our own home to grasp, is how active she still was. Far more active than most human beings. And you wouldn’t know it by watching her walk initially, because she needed a warm-up period to shake off the arthritis, but once she got going, the dog would run like the damn wind.
She would all out sprint.
At age 16, she was still hauling ass.
Until two weeks ago, she still went on daily walks. They were no longer the 1-3 mile walks she had grown accustomed to, but they were walks nonetheless about a 1/2 mile in length.
Each day I’d carry her in my arms past the tree line, because she struggled walking on uneven surfaces, and to the level grass. From there, we’d walk to her favorite tree above the lake where a year before she’d bolted into. We’d sit on the grass and soak up the sun. I wanted these moments for her. For both of us.
I wasn’t in a hurry and so we’d sit there, the two of us. I’d run the palm of my hand down her body and side. If she had died right then and there, it would’ve been, in my eyes, the perfect send-off.
What better place than this spot right here under her favorite tree?
I’d give anything to lay in the grass with her right now. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to look at this spot and tree the same way. I think I’ll always see her there.
I’ve tried to look at her life and death in a variety of ways. The unfortunate part of seeing someone or something you love at the end is that it’s hard to remember the earlier times. That era gets crowded out. What’s at the forefront is the last few hours or the last days or the last weeks.
As much as I remember about my dad from my youth, or of friends who’ve passed, it’s often a game of 50/50. I remember fifty percent of the earlier times and fifty percent of what immediately preceded their deaths, including the death itself.
It’s easy to forget the youthful years of my dog’s life. Before the sun began to set. Before the shadow grew longer. Before the shadow merged into the dark and disappeared.
If someone had told me in 2008 that getting this black and white English springer spaniel would cause one of the greatest heartaches I’d ever experience nearly seventeen years later, would I have agreed to it? I don’t know.
But what I do know, and perhaps what I’ve learned from a dog named Mozzarella Cheese, is how much love you can both give to and receive in return from an animal. And how much love hurts when the sun sets.
Love hurts.
It really, really hurts.
My heart aches. I feel it.
Here was this puppy I had during the Winter Storm of December 2009. Or, as we called it here: Snowpocalypse, when, over a two-day span, we had 23 inches of snow dumped on us in Charlottesville, Virginia.
It’s one of the memories of my dog that has stuck with me over the years more than any other.
Rain or shine, sleet or snow, dogs need to do their business.
I bundled up with gloves, boots, and doubled-up wool socks, and hooked up Motzie to her leash. Off we went. Not far. About a hundred yards from our doorstep to the side of a hill.
The top layer of snow had frozen over. I placed Motzie up on the bank and punched the snow down under her paws so she wouldn’t slide around. I stepped up on the bank beside her. She started doing her business: first she made yellow snow, then she transitioned to a needed number two.
As she was going, her business started rolling down the hill from her backside out in front of her between her front paws. The poo balls had collected snow on the frozen surface and had turned into snowballs and they were speeding down the hill like a marble race.
And she tore off after them like they were a toy to chase. As if I’d decided on an impromptu game of fetch in nearly two feet of snow.
She forgot in the moment that I was leaning down trying to snag the poo balls into a doggie doo disposable bag. And as she tore off, I was flung down the hill behind her.
I rolled down the hill in a cartoonish way, holding onto her leash in one hand and a partially filled bag of poo in the other.
She flipped head over heels. I flipped head over heels. The snow matted into her fur. The snow went down the front of my shirt. On my face. Up the cinch of my gloves.
About fifteen feet down the hill, she stopped.
When we got back to the apartment, Allison opened the door and said, “What happened to you?”
Then she looked at Motzie and asked the same.
“She just tore off down the hill after her poo,” I said. “I went with her, not on my choosing. Do I have dog poop on my back, head, anywhere you see?” I turned around in circles.
“I think you’re clear,” Allison said.
These are the memories of her I want to remember.
Less the last two weeks of her life when what I thought was her glands needed expressing or a UTI turned out to be something more sinister: the end stage of canine degenerative myelopathy, which I’d grown to believe was taking place.
The last day when I knew this was it.
Had we not taken her to Georgetown Vet on Friday, I honestly believe she wouldn’t have made it through the night. That her death would’ve been uncomfortable and possibly even traumatic for my kids.
It’s not that she was in bad shape the day before. It was that Friday morning she took a turn. Unlike previous scares when she’d had a miraculous recovery in no time flat — I swear this dog had nine lives like a cat — there didn’t seem to be any coming back on Friday.
This was it.
While my mom and sister were up visiting, my nephews and nieces upstairs playing with our kids, I laid down beside Motzie in the kitchen. I put my face to her side and felt her breath rise up and down. I told her how much I loved her and I looked in her eyes and her eyes said it all to me, “It’s okay. I’ve had a good run. I love you.”
Had I not gone through with the end on Friday would’ve been selfish of me.
I’d called the vet that morning around 8:30 AM when she woke up having diarrhea. I couldn’t speak though when I tried to form the words about the end. I started crying. Started apologizing for crying. Couldn’t even get “I’m sorry” out of my mouth without trailing off in sobs.
I handed the phone to Allison. Choked up herself, she said the words I couldn’t.
After I was able to calm my shaky voice and tears, I joined the call on speakerphone.
What Is a Lifetime Dog?
In 2010 I read the book A Good Dog: The Story of Orson, Who Changed My Life by Jon Katz. Motzie was a little over two years old at this point and I wanted to read a dog book. And to be transparent about my choosing of this book, the dog on the cover, although a border collie and not an English springer spaniel, reminded me of Motzie. Similar blaze and that innocent yet mixed with a touch of goofy expression.
There’s a paragraph within Katz’s book which resonated with me at the time of reading it, and even more so over the years. Even at two, I’d come to realize this dog who’d been living under our roof for the past couple of years was a different breed of love within my heart. Now, after her death, I can say with certainty this is true.
People who love dogs often talk about a “lifetime” dog. I’d heard the phrase a hundred times before I came to recognize its significance. Lifetime dogs intersect with our lives with particular impact; they’re dogs we love in especially powerful, sometimes inexplicable, ways. While we may cherish other pets, we may never feel that particular kind of connection with any of the rest. For lack of a better term, they are dogs we fall in love with, and for whom we often invent complex emotional histories.
Jon Katz, A Good Dog
You could argue that until the end of one’s life with dogs, it isn’t possible to say which was your once-in-a-lifetime dog. In my experience, though, people do usually know, if they’re fortunate enough to have one.
Back in July at her annual vet visit, I’d raised the topic of the end briefly to Dr. Peppard.
“Well,” he said. “Had you told me two years ago she’d still be coming in at age 16, I would have said no way based on age alone. Springers usually max out at 12-14. But her bloodwork shows a dog half the age she is,” he said. “It’ll be her mobility that gets her.”
In an ideal world, Motzie would’ve always been able to run free. Living where we did, and having leash laws in effect, running free through fields wasn’t a possibility. But she’s always gotten good exercise.
In 2010, when my wife and I chose to live where we do now, the walking trails were one of the features I loved the most. I remember hooking up Motzie to her harness and leash and setting off on foot for an adventure. We walked down paved trails and nature trails alike. Our first walk we stopped by a lake about a mile from our new home.
“This is great,” I said to her. “You’re going to love it here.”
When I started running after our daughter Annabelle was born in 2011, I attempted bringing Motzie along. She loved to run. But a good running partner she was not.
And I tried.
Oh, did I try.
Her breed, English springer spaniel, means she is a sniffer. It goes against her genetics to always walk alongside me or to be the super obedient straight line walker. She wants to explore. Flush. Sniff the air. Sniff the ground.
Stops and starts. Stops and starts.
Getting frustrated and tugging on the leash was an act of futility.
As much as it bummed me out I couldn’t take her with me on longer runs, I accepted our reality. No need to envy well-trained dogs who stuck to their owner’s side. That wasn’t my dog and it never would be, and I was okay with that.
She was a runner, yes. But more the 100-yard dash variety than the 5K.
She loved walks though.
So, a walker she was.
But even that wasn’t entirely accurate.
I’d taken her on walks since the first day she came home. It was my favorite part of the day. But she wasn’t the best walker or second best or millionth best.
She loved going for walks. Loved it more than anything (other than eating perhaps). But she’d yank your arm off if she smelled a smell she wanted to further inspect. You weren’t keeping her from the scent. She’d dig her paws into the earth and push forth like a tank.
She was a medium-sized dog with the strength of a sled-pulling Siberian husky.
The first time I tore my right shoulder labrum was partially because of her.
Early on in her life, I’d get annoyed she’d do this. When she was a puppy, she didn’t quite have the strength to pull me. What she’d manage was, in a word, cute. When she was around one year of age, it felt like the scene in Marley and Me when the wife tries to walk the dog and she gets yanked headfirst into the grass and then dragged behind.
Once Motzie hit three years old and was full of brute strength, it was completely unmanageable. From ages three to fourteen, I didn’t walk her. She walked me. She walked me wherever she wanted to walk me. No sense fighting it.
As I’d gear up to take her for a walk, Allison would ask, “Where are you two going?”
And I’d respond, “Wherever the wind blows. Wherever she decides to take me. We’ll be back… sometime.”
Back in 2020, during the pandemic, my kids got big into skateboarding. I took them to a vacant parking lot along with the dog.
“Can I walk her?” my daughter asked. She was nine years old.
“You’re on a skateboard,” I said.
“I know.”
“It’s probably a terrible idea, but why not?” I said. She was wearing a helmet and pads. I figured Motzie could only wreck her so much being that she was in full protective gear.
Kind of made sense actually. Why hadn’t I thought of wearing full protective gear earlier, even for me?
Funny enough, skateboard dog walking became a routine in our household for the better part of a year and a half until empty parking lots started filling back up with vehicles.
It’s Tuesday now, another day has passed, and so far I haven’t cried yet. It’s the first day I haven’t woken up crying. I’m sure it’ll come at some point, but writing has been helpful in processing my emotions.
It’s weird to write without her by my side. She was always resting at my feet when I’d sit down to write. It feels strange everywhere I turn. When she was younger, if she was in the house and out of sight, it almost always meant she was up to mischief.
Sometimes my shadow would wander off
I’d wonder where my shadow could be
Then I’d think of the most likely place
And find her under the bed
Tucked back into the corner
Just out of my reach
At her nose a treasure trove of food scraps:
Diapers, socks
Shoes, toilet paper, flip flops
Somebody’s underwear
“Allison, I found your underwear.”
No matter how many times
I told her “no” to stealing off with these items
The scolding she received was worth it in her eyes.
I wasn’t really mad anyway. The entire scene playing out was ridiculous. More humorous than anything.
“Where’s the dog?” a common refrain said aloud in our house for many, many years.
“Check under the bed first.”
“Have you seen my shoes?”
“Check under the bed.”
“Where’s the hair brush?”
“Check under the bed.”
“Anyone seen my toothbrush?”
“Check under the bed.”
The day before Allison and I moved from our apartment on Pantops to our new home, we made the unwise decision to allow Motzie free rein while we were away. No crate today. Total freedom.
We’d packed up all our belongings and stored them in boxes in the garage and in a closed door bedroom.
There wasn’t anything she could get into and she never had any accidents in the house, so that was the least of our concerns.
Unfortunately, she seemed to think that either me, Allison, or both of us were hiding away in one of the bedrooms with the door shut and that we hadn’t left the apartment.
When we returned from work later that evening, we heard whimpering and scratching inside our apartment as we walked downstairs. Opening our entry door, we saw her, then we saw the destruction.
The carpet at the closed bedroom door was torn to shreds down to the staples, pulled back about three feet, and the baseboards were clawed and chewed to splinters.
She’d apparently thought we were in there all day and she wanted to get to us.
Needless to say, we didn’t get our rent deposit back.
The day we moved into our new home was the day Allison learned she was pregnant with our first child, Annabelle. Our last day at our apartment still fresh in our memory, we decided it best to crate Motzie in the house during the day while we went off to work.
A month in, we opted against the crate. She’d grown bigger and being confined in a crate all day felt overkill. It was her house, too.
Up went the crate to the attic. Out went Motzie into the house free as a bird in the wild.
While shopping for a nice trash can for our house, we picked up a stainless steel model with a foot pedal and lid. An open trash can, we learned quickly, wouldn’t work around Motzie.
Neither did a stainless steel trash can with a foot pedal and lid we’d quickly learn.
But before we learned the hard way, we placed our new trash can next to the back patio door in the kitchen. Perfect spot.
My office was close by and I’d gotten into a habit of coming home from work during lunch. This was before I began working remotely. I had an hour long break and would use the spare 30 minutes to take her for a walk and eat my lunch alongside her.
It didn’t take Motzie long to figure out the foot pedal mechanism on the trash can. She’d clearly been watching us when we threw our trash away. She wanted in, and if there’s a will, there’s a way.
I returned home for lunch one day at noon. I was excited to see her. Taking her for a walk mid-day had become the highlight of my day. Then I opened the front door.
Trash was everywhere.
And I mean everywhere.
Chicken paper wrapping.
Greasy paper towels from draining bacon.
Anything and everything you can think of that would go in a trash can.
It was spread down the hallway.
Up and down the stairs.
In the living room.
In the half-bath.
The kitchen itself was the ultimate disaster.
Motzie, of course, was nowhere to be found.
But I’d seen a blur run up the steps from the front door window when I’d placed my key inside.
“Motzie,” I yelled. “Where are you?”
And upon seeing the wreckage before me: “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
I texted a photo of the trash can disaster to Allison at work.
“So much for a walk and lunch,” I said. “I’ll be cleaning my entire break.”
As I walked upstairs, I heard claws dig into carpet in our bedroom. Then the scooting sound of a dog’s belly against the carpet as she made her way under our bed.
“Get your behind out from that bed,” I said to her, laying down on my stomach.
There was a treasure trove of trash under the bed at her nose and teeth.
I started grabbing at the items, at one point pulling a chewed up feminine hygiene product back toward me unaware of what it was in the moment.
“Come on, Motzie,” I said. “Come on, puppy.”
Then she growled at me and bared her teeth.
“Oh, no,” I said. “That’s not how this works.”
But actually, it was exactly how it worked because I couldn’t reach her. No matter how many times I repositioned myself, my arms, as long as they are, couldn’t quite grab hold of her.
I walked back downstairs, grabbed the broom, and got to cleaning. Then mopping. Then I placed our brand spanking new stainless steel trash can with foot pedal that was now scratched to hell with a big dent on its exterior outside on the back patio and locked the door.
“She’s upstairs under the bed,” I texted Allison. “I can’t get her. I have to go back to work. I cleaned up everything I could but there are still some items under the bed. FYI she ate a tampon. Pretty sure there’s another one under the bed.”
This is all a long way of submitting to the historical record why our trash can lives in a coat closet downstairs, and has for the past fourteen and a half years.
“Where’s your trash can?” people used to ask when they’d visit.
“In the closet.”
And you’d think, think, we’d learn our trash can lesson completely from this experience. But when Allison and I started making babies, and in turn our babies started making dirty diapers, we didn’t.
Because it’s a dirty diaper.
It’s not food.
It’s not leftovers from dinner.
No chicken paper wrapping.
No bits of bacon or greasy paper towels.
No delectable gourmet meal.
Dirty diapers.
Didn’t stop Motzie.
When Annabelle was first born, we used to keep her door open so the diaper trash can didn’t stink up the joint.
Big mistake.
Instead of coming home for lunch to find a war zone in our kitchen strung throughout the two stories of our house, I came home to find a dirty diaper trash can raided. Bits of diaper and you know what else scattered throughout the upstairs hallway leading, yes, under our bed.
“I can’t take you for a walk when you do this Motzie,” I said to her.
“Grrrrrr,” she growled from under the bed. “Grrrrrrr.”
Translation: My dirty diaper and you’re not getting it from me.
Motzie’s always been a big eater. Her weight was always something we struggled with. It started as fault of our own.
When we took her to the vet early on in life, the vet asked us how much we were feeding her.
“A cup for breakfast. A cup for dinner,” my wife answered.
“Any snacks or treats in between?” the vet asked.
“Yeah, we give her treats here and there. Not a lot. A bone on occasion,” I said.
“She’s a bit overweight for her age,” the vet said. “Does she exercise?”
“Every day,” I said. “Quite a bit.”
“And you said you feed her one cup in the morning and one cup in the evening?” the vet inquired again.
“Yes, one cup, twice a day,” my wife said.
“How big is the cup? Is it like a measuring cup?” the vet asked.
“Umm, no,” my wife said. “It’s like one of those giant cups they give you at UVA Football games for your soft drink.”
“Okay,” the vet said. “That may be about three or four cups each meal then.”
“Hmm,” my wife and I said together.
Motzie was never fat. Someone may argue she was. But if you put your hand on her, she was solid as a rock. Her leg and back muscles were a sight to see. And if you shaved her down to the skin, not that we ever did, she probably would’ve looked like one of those ultra-muscular chimpanzees with a genetic hair loss problem.
It wasn’t until her annual wellness visit at 15 years old, she fell within the ideal weight range for her breed.
Her muscular legs had started to shrink. Same for her back. We still walked and we still ran our sprints together. But not to the degree as in her youth.
She still had her moments, but over all she had slowed down.
Bursts of energy, I called them. She still had her bursts.
Our backyard squirrels have taken notice to her absence these last few days. More and more are sniffing around on our patio than normal. Even before her passing, they were less leery of her. As a senior dog, she wouldn’t give them chase any more. Those days had passed and the squirrels were safe on the bank in our yard with her not being able to ascend an incline at a rapid speed any longer.
It was an interesting change. Gone were the days of the endless chase. Present were the days when the squirrels and birds would gather around nearby as she snoozed away on the patio.
She used to stalk the squirrels in our yard. Hide behind the raised garden bed. Spring out when an unsuspecting squirrel would walk by and stop to dig in the ground.
She only killed one squirrel in her life. I was at home working then. Out in my workshop. On a conference call. I heard a commotion but couldn’t check it out immediately.
When the call ended, I walked out of my workshop and there was a dead squirrel on the patio.
“Aww, Motzie,” I said to her. I didn’t chastise her though. Was just sad the squirrel was dead.
A part of me thinks she didn’t want to kill it. She just wanted to play. A living, breathing stuffed animal. But her breed is a hunting dog, birds mainly, and it’s her instinct.
She looked up at me and I noticed her face was covered in blood. At first, I thought it was the squirrel’s blood.
Nope.
Hers.
The squirrel had managed to take a sizable chunk out of her face under her eye.
I emailed my boss.
“My dog was just bitten in the face by a squirrel and needs stitches,” my email said. “I’ll be back this evening.”
The email wasn’t far off from an email I’d sent a year or two prior which read: “My dog was just bitten in the face by a snake. I need to go to the vet.”
I’d seen that incident. Tried my damndest to keep her away from the snake. It was only a garter, but it’d been living at the edge of our backyard since we moved in and would occasionally venture into our yard at various times of the day to sun.
She didn’t manage to kill the snake. The garter rose up, struck, then slithered away scot free into a shrub outside our fence.
Leaving annual check-ups aside, I have no idea how much money we’ve spent at the vet’s office and the vet hospital over the last sixteen-and-a-half years. I know we dropped more than three grand at the vet hospital alone for late nights and weekend visits: $1,000-plus each visit on three separate occasions.
When I mentioned she liked to eat earlier, I wasn’t talking just food scraps and diapers. She got into everything, including my mother-in-law’s blood pressure medication one time around 2018.
The good news is she didn’t appear to eat one of the pills. We didn’t know that, however.
I just happened to find an open pill bottle with blood pressure medication scattered about in the carpet in our upstairs bedroom. She’d nosed through a purse she’d managed to knock off a desk while we were gone.
We rushed off to the vet hospital for a stomach pump, charcoal, and an IV and monitoring.
Upon release she bound out the door as if nothing had transpired.
“I have love to share. Let’s roll.”
Dog Hugs
I loved hugging my dog. She loved big hugs. She wasn’t a fan of being a witness to my wife and I hugging. She’d start barking at us if we embraced. We’d even do it jokingly to get her going.
For a while, we thought she didn’t like it when we hugged. But what we realized was that wasn’t it. She just didn’t want to be left out.
So I’d pat my hand on my side, inviting her to join in the middle of our hug and she’d hop up on her hind legs and nuzzle her way in.
She’d pant and smile the smile dogs do as we’d hug her. Then she’d hop back down on all fours and look at us like, “Okay, we hugged. I feel the love now. Let’s go do something. Or eat. Your choice.”
Your paws left prints on my heart,
And sometimes on the floor,
But the way you’d tilt your head sideways at me
Made me love you even more.
Where did my shadow go?
Why did you have to leave?
Come on. Let’s go for a walk
Just a second while I grab your leash.
But you’re not around the corner
You’re no longer resting at my feet
You’re not snoozing away on your bed
Or barking at the UPS man parked on the street.
I want my shadow back
I want my shadow near
I want to look into your sleepy brown eyes
And tickle your grinchy feet
(Even though I know you hated that)
Now the house is far too quiet
The house that you called home
I hear phantom barks, poots, and snoring
I see you wallowing on your bone.
For shadows like yours don’t vanish,
They merge into us and make us whole
And although I feel broken now,
I know your shadow lives on in my soul.
I once had a shadow
A shadow far furrier than me
She had four legs, a black and white coat, and docked tail
Her name was Mozzarella Cheese.
A Thanksgiving Weekend Not to Remember
Saturday night, at 11:45 PM, my son Henry startled my wife and me awake. Motzie had passed the day before, and here, fifteen minutes before midnight the day after, my son had woken from his sleep and found his pet hamster Homey dead in her cage.
“I didn’t hear her running on her wheel,” he said. “When I went to check on her she was dead.”
My heart was racing at being startled awake with my son crying in the dark. It took me a minute to come to my senses and process what was being said. What was wrong.
We walked upstairs to his room and Homey, the Chinese dwarf hamster, had indeed passed. On Sunday, my son and I walked to the back of our fence and I dug a hole for Homey to be buried.
A few minutes later, we held a funeral. All four of us. We all said a few words.
“Homey didn’t want Motzie to be alone,” he said. “I’ll miss you little buddy. Tell Motzie I said hello.”
Two pets in two days.
A Thanksgiving break to remember for the ages.
We’d stayed home this year for Thanksgiving. It wasn’t an ideal scenario, but Motzie wasn’t fit to travel the two-and-half hours back home and I’m grateful, in hindsight, we didn’t attempt it.
I’d offered to stay home with our dog while my wife and kids traveled, but my wife wouldn’t budge.
“I want us all to be together for Thanksgiving,” she said.
And Thursday, Thanksgiving Day, was a good day. It was coincidentally Motzie’s last meal. We were all together, all five of us, one last time.
I didn’t know the next morning would signal the end.
That in a few short hours I’d be saying goodbye to our beloved family dog that had been a part of my life since my mid-20s.
Before my wife and I were married.
Or even engaged.
The morning I proposed to Allison, back in January of 2009, Motzie was there as I concocted my engagement surprise. We had an inside joke being that we named our dog Mozzarella.
Instead of “I love you,” we’d say, “I cheese you” to each other. So, I felt it was only fitting to cut out a piece of cheese into the shape of a heart. I also laid out rose petals leading to the “I [Heart] You” display. I scattered them from the hallway into the bedroom of our apartment. Next to the cheese display was the engagement ring.
As I walked off to grab Allison, Motzie took it upon herself to slink into our bedroom and eat the cheese heart display. She vacuumed up half the scattered rose petals in her snout. As Allison walked back with me, blindfolded, I stopped.
“Oh, shit!” I said. “Hold on.”
“I’m waiting,” Allison said.
Motzie had taken off and dipped under the bed.
Of course she had.
I frantically searched for the engagement ring.
Did she eat it?
“Motzie,” I said to her under the bed. “Please tell me you didn’t just eat the ring.”
Thankfully no, although she’d clearly considered it. There was a bit of dog spit and cheese at the band. It was pushed against the baseboard of the wall.
“One second,” I said to Allison while I walked back into another spare room and grabbed the cheese outline of the heart instead, then re-scattered the remaining rose petals.
“I cheese you,” I said to Allison as I took off her blindfold and went down to one knee. “Will you marry me?”
“Yes,” she said, and we kissed.
Motzie sprang out from under the bed and whoa whoa whoa’d at us, then joined in our embrace.
My entire adult life Motzie has been by my side.
There for all the big moments it seems.
Before we had children.
Before my dad died.
Here was a dog, who not only met my dad, something my kids were never fortunate enough to have done, but shared a particular day on the calendar with him: her first birthday on May 21, 2009 — the day my dad passed away from leukemia.
I’ve always thought of that day, May 21, when it rolls around each year, not as the day my dad died, but the day Motzie was born.
And now, Friday, November 29, 2024, was it.
Her day.
The end of an era.
The chapter of my life that began with a dog named Mozzarella Cheese was coming to a close.
It was the right thing to do. The single hardest decision I’ve ever made in my life, but the right thing nonetheless.
At 3:00 PM, my wife and I placed Motzie in the backseat of our car for one last ride and traveled to Georgetown Vet. Her appointment for the Rainbow Bridge was set for 3:30 PM.
I’d wanted her to pass peacefully in her sleep, but that wasn’t going to happen.
She deserved a painless send-off and her health had taken a turn early Friday morning.
Motzie’s vet, Dr. Peppard, a man I hold in high regard who loved her as much as a vet can love another person’s dog, administered the sedative, then, a few minutes later the IV that would allow her to rest forever.
The vet tech who’d been with her on all her visits over the years joined us in the room.
Motzie didn’t fight it.
She laid there comfortably.
Accepted it.
My wife and I rubbing her side and talking to her through until the end.
Crying of course.
Tears straight from the heart.
Deep within our souls.
So much crying.
As she breathed her last breath.
Our sweet girl until the end.
In writing this out, I hope no one has come away with a picture painted of a dog in distress or in pain. Of a dog that we, as a family, held on for too long. I would never have done that to Motzie. Nor would my wife.
She was a sweet dog with a wild streak. Independent at times and dependent on our attention just the same. She loved my wife, my kids who she wouldn’t let out of her sight when they were younger, and me. And we loved her with our everything.
Motzie was, more than anything, a resilient and tough dog. She had moments throughout her life when the question is this it? came up. Usually it involved a trip to the vet hospital where she’d gotten into something — somehow, some way.
Then, a day later, sometimes hours later, she’d miraculously be okay.
When she had her first seizure in January 2024, I assumed she wouldn’t even make it to her sixteenth birthday in May. But then she never had another seizure until this November. And even with that seizure, it was like it never happened a few hours later.
Two weeks before her death, she still went on daily walks.
And even within the days counting down from two weeks it wasn’t a situation of pain. She ate voraciously. Drink water. Slept soundly during the day. Her sundowners at night lessened.
It was as if she was prepping for her third act.
But her third act was over. There would be no encore.
I stopped walking her when I noticed her backside was irritating her. Instead of walking, she’d try to get to her tail area. What I’d originally thought was her glands needing expressing or even a UTI was neither.
We’d set off to the vet and been prescribed antibiotics. We put her back on gabapentin. But whatever was ailing her had no cure.
In the early morning hours of Friday, my wife and I made the decision.
As much as we loved her, it was her time.
She’d given us so much, our kids so much.
And while it’s true I never wanted to put her down, that I wanted it to happen naturally, I also wasn’t going to watch her suffer.
Not after all these years.
Not now.
Not at the end.
Had I known my last walk with her was going to be the last, it’s possible I would’ve stayed out there under her favorite tree on the hill overlooking the lake a few minutes longer.
But the truth is, we stayed under that tree a long time. Forty five minutes. Maybe an hour. I rubbed her side and talked to her. Whispered in her ear how much I loved her. Re-lived silly memories of her mischief and hijinks. Reminded her of meeting our children for the first time once they were released from the hospital as newborns.
I cried that day.
Just like today. The tears came again for me, after all.
Five days later.
Everywhere I turn I’m reminded of her.
Inside.
Outside.
Everywhere.
You had my heart, dog.
You had my heart.
I Once Had a Shadow
I once had a shadow
A shadow far furrier than me
She had four legs, a black and white coat, and docked tail
We called her Motzie.
Mozzarella Cheese Watkins Pillow
AKA Motzie, the English Springer Spaniel
May 21, 2008 – November 29, 2024
