My Heart has Joined the Hundred

It's never a good thing when your wife tells you that you aren't going to work today.

My first impulse is to argue with her. After all, it's a work day, so I really ought to be at work.

It sucks that she's never wrong.


Our Tatiana passed away this morning, sometime in the dark hours of the night, stretched out in her favorite sleeping spot.

My heart is already heavy with missing her.

For those that will ask, she was an old girl for being a large, mostly outside dog. I could tell for the last month or two that her time with us was winding down. I was waiting for some sign from her that it was no longer fun anymore, that she no longer enjoyed her life, that she was suffering.

She was our happy, excited, goofy girl right up to the end. She spent Sunday morning racing MonkeyDo for the plums MonkeyDo was shaking out of the tree. She loved eating plums. Is that weird? Because it seems so weird. But she loved plum season, and she'd eat up any that she could get.

I feel fortunate and blessed that she lived most of her life with us, instead of that asshole that had her first. That she was never plagued with the hip problems associated with large dogs or Akitas, in particular. That she never seemed to hurt or suffer. That she did not suffer in the end, but went quietly, in her time, on her terms.

She was always the Alpha Dog, even though she sometimes let on that she didn't care either way.

I have felt so safe with her all these years. Knowing she never barked unless she had something to tell us. Knowing she always told us if there was a problem in the neighborhood. She always made sure we knew, and then she'd stop.

And the year when SweetPea stayed a few nights with her grandmother, and Tatiana slept in the room with me. On our bed. Laying on my legs. A joy in August in an unairconditioned house, let me tell you. She'd wake me up a couple of hours later to let me know that she'd had about enough of this "inside" business, and she'd like to go back out, now, thanks.

If you threw the ball for her, she'd sit at your feet and watch it go, and then look up at you like "well, that was a pretty fucking stupid thing to do".

And today we laid her to rest under the plum tree.