“A dog is the only thing on earth that loves you more than he loves himself.”

“A dog is the only thing on earth that loves you more than he loves himself.” 

Yesterday my sweet girl lost her battle with cancer.  It was the most heart wrenching decision ever, even if it was out of the highest form of love.   Whoever said "Doing the right thing feels good"  obviously never had to decide to end one of their best friends life.  

Minnie had been fighting this battle for 9 months with a quiet strength & beauty I have envied. I've called her my Princess Warrior.  But the time came for me to be the strong one and make that decision.  I've been in this position before and you would think it would get easier but this was the hardest of all.  Maybe it is my bond with her, it seems to be stronger than most others.  Maybe the fact I was not ready for her to go.  Or maybe as we get older we hold the true meaning of life and the joys in it closer to our hearts & they are harder to let go.

I had made arrangements a couple of months ago when the time came to drive her all the way up to Pueblo to say our final good bye & then take her to a funeral home where they do pet cremation.  After losing Ranger last summer & dealing with the coyotes & one bear in particular digging him up I told the Cowboy I could not and would not deal with that again.  I became a craZed woman sitting on the porch with a gun and trying to run a bear down with my pickup not to mention the bad dreams that followed.

I laid in bed in the early hours yesterday praying some freak of nature would happen and the sun wouldn't rise, but it did.  So we made it a day all about Minnie.  Scrambled eggs & bacon for breakfast followed by a big bowl of ice cream for a snack.  Then we asked her if she wanted to do her favorite thing......  G  O  ??  Yep, she's so smart she figured out the word "GO" years ago so we started spelling it and she figured that out too.  LOL.  For an old girl on her last leg literally, (2 very bad hips & one front leg twice it's size from cancer complications) she bolted out the door like a jack rabbit & she beat me to the pickup!!

Minnie & Momma on our last "G O"

  I felt like the worse traitor ever knowing where we were going.   I just hope it gave her some joy in getting to G O one more time & she will forgive me somehow.  We had to stop first for the Cowboy to have a checkup at his Dr & as I sat with her in the back seat of the truck waiting on him at the hospital I caught a glimpse of our girl in her just like she was before she got sick, laying in the sunshine, watching people go by and as always the loyalty she has shown for both of us as she watched & waited for him to come back out of the doors that had swallowed him up earlier.  Our journey continued with her laying in my lap & letting her eat all the junk food she wanted.

On a normal trip I would have been enjoying the scenery but I couldn't seem to do anything but hold her, trying to focus on the love & memories but that is kind of hard to do when you know the days destination.  I was trying to not cry or let her sense my feelings but I didn't succeed as she was again the one comforting me.  It was almost like she was telling me it was ok.  It was ok, until the Zac Brown song "Goodbye in her eyes" came on.  

Those words cut through my heart like a knife, slicing through 9 months of built up emotions & the tears came tumbling.

I saw goodbye in her eyes
I don't think I can change it
There's no way to disguise
We will never make it

Now she sees right through me

Should I hold on to what we've got
Is it just a waste of time?
One thing that I know for sure
I saw goodbye in her eyes

I will always think of her & that moment in time when I hear that song from now on.  And did I mention it played at least 5 times yesterday??  Some day's I think the universe is just out to get me. :(

I held her in my lap kissing her & telling her how much I loved her as she gently left this world.  Right now I am holding on to a vision of her running to greet Ranger on the Rainbow Bridge & them running off side by side and the conversations they are probably having.  That makes me smile......

  I loved it when she ran & her ears bounced straight up!

Rest in Peace my sweet girl.

  Life won't be the same with out you here but it is forever changed because you were in it.