Trudy........

Monday, March 31...../08

Trudy died this morning about 9:30.....very quietly, as she did most things.....she was absolutely the most gentle dog I’ve ever known.......

When you own a dog, or sumtimes more appropriately, when a dog owns you, it becomes a symbiotic relationship and you develop a feeling of responsibility. P’raps that is part of the explanation for why people (adults) acquire pets for their children (l’il people). Anyway, dogs take care of their people and look out for them to the best of their ability. And people are s’pozed to take care of their dogs.
Trudy was older when she came to us.....six or seven, at least & becuz we were older also, the SPCA didn’t charge us an adoption fee......we never knew what kind of life she had before us.....we postulated that she may have been a breeder, kept in a kennel & while she may not have been abused, she seemed to be lacking in some ways........she was with us for months before she ever barked & it was then we found out what it meant for a dog to have been ‘debarked’......’Course, she didn’t know that she’d been debarked & once she found out that we didn’t discourage her from talking, she yapped incessantly when she wanted.....she had a hoarse bark, sort of like Lauren Bacall which, now that I think on it, might have been a better name for her than Trudy.
Her previous name had been Treasure. We found that out when our Vet traced her history for us. Millyrose didn’t like that name and Emily & Sophia suggested Trudy.
And Trudy she was....our dowager Princess, dignified & too beautiful to be bothered with undognified behavior..
She became Millyrose’s shadow except when she wanted out in the mornings & when she wanted her treats when she came back inside.......
I’ve had a lot of dogs over the years & the passing of each of them has left a void...or so it seems at the time of their passing. But that’s a misnomer.....thinking back, I c’n recall all of them...each and every one of them.....
Justin Other Smith