Remembering Anni

by Lois
(Wilmington, NC)

Anni was my first very own dog and my third Standard Poodle. I had her euthanized at age fifteen a year and a half ago. She was my left arm, always with me. We did alot of jogging and hiking together. She was not fancy. I bought her from a back yard breeder in Woodstock, NY and we knew the little brown pup would grow up to be a thirty pound beauty with a wisdom and spark that would go well into her fourteenth year.

Her immune system took a hit around that time and I don't know why. She got mange, probably from neighboring foxes and the medication: megadoses of heartworm pills, cured her of it, but then she got a tumour on her nose and her eyesight and hearing began to go. Her body was still strong when I put her down, but I knew that she had a life that was not what she wanted and didn't want me to have.

There were some telling moments with me and Anni, when she tried to leap a log in the forest and couldn't quite make it, and another time when she ran around the yard like a puppy, almost wildly, leaping off ridges that were steeper than she knew. I knew she was telling me--I am losing my sight--I am getting old...

She could not make it down the steps from upstairs to downstairs very well and there were afew times she tumbled down, only to pick herself up and trot with a smile into the dining room. She was so game. She and I rode out her diminishing health as best we could, admiring each other and our past life together.

I have Charley now. He's a wonderful, crazy black Standard that dances and runs like a fool around the yard. I talk to him about Anni. I tell him that I grieve more for her than anyone else I have lost in my 65 years of life.
Typical of a Standard, even though he has a big ego, he is gentle, and I know, he understands.....