“Once you have had a wonderful dog, a life without one, is a life diminished.”
—Dean Koontz
—Dean Koontz
As I haven't seen any notes about past pets, I guess it is fine to also draw animal companions which sadly already left this world and went ahead to scout the way. Even if it's been almost three years without my dog now, she still feels like my pet.
After my family moved into an old farm house with a huge garden when I was six years old, my parents decided that we needed a dog. Both of them had grown up with them and knew well that happiness starts with a wet nose and ends with a wagging tail. So Miko entered our life, a little pitch-black bundle of fluff and sharp white teeth. Eight brothers, the only girl, a real fighter the friendly elderly couple told us. So she got her name and we all wondered just how big she was going to grow with these huge paws.
Big. Very big. In the end she stood 70cm (28 inches) high at the shoulder, weighted a good 35 kg (77 pounds) and turned from the black fluff to a mess of wiry hair, soft spots and how-on-earth-is-this-colour-called?! Black fur with white hair, brown beard, brown eyebrows, spot on the forehead, another one on the chest. We bought the unwanted offspring of a German Shepherd lady and a Bouvier des Flandres and got something that looked very much like a Giant Schnauzer cross Wolfsdog gone mad. We loved her to bits. My sister and I grew up with her, she ripped our favourite shoes to shreds and in turn we taught her how to jump through our hoola-hoops. She stole strawberries from the branches and just every fruit in our garden fell victim to her.
When my sister was lovesick again she first licked away her tears and then the left-over icecream. When I was feeling bad and fled into the vast meadows and nearby forest she happily followed me. Our friends would learn that coming over to play ment walking the dog first and that you cannot simply wash out these wiry dog hair's out of your jeans. She loved muddy puddles, dead animal's at the roadside, just everything dirty and messy. She never would bring back the sticks and balls, just try to rip them apart. But for some precious biscuits she would even do Agility and Obedience training with you.
She passed away completely unexpected and it all took us very, very long to accept the silence that would now follow to the ringing doorbell. But life went on and much has changed. She's still here with us, somehow. We all said we never again wanted a dog, but I saw my father check the homepage of the local shelter last Christmas. Just out of curiousity, he said.
My sister and I are both students now, living in small flats with next to no garden and odd working hours. But who knows, a few years from now I think I'll have dog hairs on my jeans again.
i <3 the computer
