Saying Good-bye

I understand that our family dog is dying. Bacchus hasn't lived with us for a few years and has been keeping my dad company for a while now. I want to tell his story.

I was never much of a dog person. Growing up in New Jersey, we had two vicious German Shepherds that lived behind our house - Big Mama and Spike. I was terrified of them. Turned me off to dogs for a long, long time. We didn't have any of our own. In my teens, my dad married a woman with dogs and I lived with them all. Dad and his wife got me a puppy, Arielle the Golden Retriever. Not entirely sure why - a distraction? I didn't really know how to care for a dog but they did - better than how to care for me. I'm pretty sure those dogs got a lot more attention than I did in that household. I recall having to ride my bike to a basketball game in the winter, while I was coming down with strep, because my dad couldn't take me since he had to take the dog to dog school instead. Yet another reason I decided dogs weren't for me. I wasn't ever going to play second to one again. I remember my dad and his wife used to send Christmas cards with pictures of them and the pets. Not once did we ever send a Christmas card with pictures of the kids. When their marriage was struggling, they kicked me out...and kept the dogs (including my Arielle).

When Steve and I first married, we had a great house in San Diego with a huge yard that screamed "I need a dog." I couldn't deny it. Steve was dying to get a dog. He even knew what he wanted to name it - "Chucho." We weren't actively looking, but one day we were out hiking and wine tasting and came across an unknown winery with a sign out front that said, "Free Puppies." Steve convinced me to look at the puppies. SUCKER! There was one black one in the litter, a little quiet. We were meant to find him, and he was meant for us. And since he came from a winery, we named him Bacchus, after the Roman god of wine. The punchline is that he is half German Shepherd. Irony. We tried to train him, I swear. I still have video of the circle from dog training class. Bacchus was supposed to cross the circle to his owner. He unceremoniously stopped mid-circle to relieve himself on a pile of leashes. That's my boy!

Steve and I moved to Temecula the day I went into labor with our first child. In fact, we called a friend to meet the movers at the new house to unload one delivery while I went to the hospital for another delivery. Poor Bacchus spent his first day at his new home surrounded by nothing and no one he knew. He must have felt awful. I gave birth at 6:34 PM, and after we knew everyone was going to be OK, I sent Steve home so that Bacchus wouldn't have to spend his first night in his new house thinking he'd been abaondoned. Steve came to visit his new baby during the days, and spent his nights with his canine baby.

Bacchus made friends in his new home. But wow, that dog was loud. While he was making friends, I was making enemies. New neighbor compliained about the barking. And of course everytime the doorbell rang, there it was: WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF. Always seemed to happen during baby's naptime - bye bye nap! We soon bought a bark collar. I hated to do it but I planned to live in our new house for a long time with those neighbors, and I needed my babies to nap, so Bacchus had to play second fiddle.

We probably should have taken more time to make Bacchus more kid-friendly. We assumed he was because he was always terrific with our kids (two of them at the time) but we didn't anticipate a few things. Once he tried to bite a neighbor kid who was extricating food from Bacchus' mouth. Another time he snapped at a neighbor kid who tried to wake him while he was sleeping, from behind. Provoked? Maybe. But in a neighborhood with 25 kids you can't risk having your neighbors be afraid of your dog, or that your dog will again react inappropriately. We had to give Bacchus away. We were heartbroken. How do you give away a part of your family?

Irony strikes again. My father was now divorced from his second wife and living 20 minutes from me. He had recently lost his own dog, Susie, a few months prior (Arielle had died in an accident some years earlier). I remember when Susie died. My dad is not known to show emotion, but he was choked up when I was on the phone with him about Susie. My dad agreed to let Bacchus live with him. Since dad watches my kids once a week, we still get to see Bacchus all the time because Bacchus comes with him. My third child, whom we did not have when Bacchus was living with us, still formed a unique bond with Bacchus and clearly called out Ba-Ba in reference him early on. And even when she could say "Bacchus," it morphed into "Ba-Ba-cchus" in deference to those first words. It was even funnier when she started calling him the nickname my dad had given him, "Bubbula." I will be forever grateful to my dad for taking Bacchus in and saving us the torment of having to place him in an unknown home. My dad and Bacchus are great together, really companions. I think Bacchus is perhaps his favorite housemate, more than his wives or kids.

About two months ago, my dad told us Bacchus had cancer. This is the first my kids can really remember dealing with major illness. They were too young to remember my mom having breast cancer. So we talked about it a lot, because we knew there was a chance he might not recover well, if at all. He had a splenectomy and they thought the prognosis was good. Next time he was back at our house, he seemed nearly good as new. The kids understood Bacchus was sick and they recognize where his fur was shaved for the operation, but I think that because he's been so active with them on his last few visits, they didn't know the situation was still pretty bad - could have fooled me too!

Today my dad called to report that Bacchus had taken a turn for the worse. Vet says the cancer has spread, he has a lot of internal bleeding, and may not make it through the night. He has pain meds now. Dad says Bacchus is acting oddly - choosing to lay down in uncharacteristic places, and staying outside when it's still in the 90s and the house is much cooler. Dad thinks Bacchus is looking for a place to die quietly.

I have tried to explain this to my kids, that it's OK if Bacchus dies, and it's OK to be sad about it, and to know that if Bacchus passes, it will be because that's what God needed to do to take away Bacchus' pain. My dad is in pain too, I can hear it in his voice. It's disturbing a bit, to see my dad put so much emotion behind a dog when he spent so many years ignoring relationships with his kids. Maybe I am jealous that he never cried over me. But I don't want to see Dad hurting either; I am still so grateful that Dad took in Bacchus when we needed him too. A little payback, I think, from him to me.

Bacchus - be well and be safe and be happy. We love you, Ba-Ba-cchus. All the kids said a prayer for you tonight and they understand if you don't come visit this week.