She's Headed Outside

Our elderly dog prefers to pant it out in the blistering muggy heat of a Middle Tennessee August afternoon instead of breathing free and easy in the air-conditioned coolness of our ceramic-tiled kitchen.  This preference of hers manifested within the past six months, actually increasing in desire as the weather has heated up.  Because this is not a normal life-cycle behavior for her, we attribute this new habit to her age.  My mom reminded me that some dogs prefer to seek their refuge in the great outdoors, often a distance from their home if possible, as death becomes more imminent.  Though I know that to be true, I don't believe that's the case here.  For one, she seeks out the shady cool spot between the large rocks and the oakleaf hydrangea on the north side of the house: right up against the house.  Secondly, though her hips are tight and her movements a little on the drag n' jerky side, our Husky-mix still loves to walk, often jumping and barking like a pup while she waits impatiently for me to attach the leash that I dangle in a teasing manner before her.

She's just gotten a bit funny in the head with the passing of years.  Never one to exhibit stubbornness, she now displays a decidedly stubborn bent in certain areas.  Mainly, it revolves around this need of hers to be outside.  I'll order her to 'stay.'  She gives me a look which tells me I'm about to watch my dog ignore me and do what she wants to do.  And, then she does it.  Slinking a bit and adopting a slow measured gait, she ambles away, avoiding eye contact though her head is ever so slightly bent in my direction.  Straight to the hidden interior of the dog house she goes.  I follow.  I tip the house.  She clings, trying hard not to spill forth and into my hands.  The other day, in fact, the house was all the way over, with the entrance to the ground, and when I uprighted it, she was still inside.  I win, though.  I have to win because a dog needs to listen to its owner for the sake of safety and that comes with an established hierarchy in the pack.  Usually, I have to grab her by the collar and escort her back into the house.  I make her 'sit' and 'stay.'  Then, she is allowed to return to her weathered little hound hut.  Only once she is given permission and her lead attached, back to the north side she goes.

We realized a few months back that what we at first thought was her ignoring us in all aspects of obedience turned out to be her not hearing us.  To be sure of this, we tested her in a variety of ways.  "Panda, Panda.  Wanna' go on a walk?" was the line we used, starting in a low volumes and steadily increasing with each repetition, watching for any reaction.  We tried this while she was facing us; we tried it when she was turned in the opposite direction.  Until we reached a decidedly higher level of sound than was once necessary, she simply did not react.  I was amazed at this.  Humbled and a bit humiliated by it, in fact, as I thought she was not listening to me during our walks and yanked the leash rather smartly a few times.  I also realized that her need to urinate more frequently but with less output was connected to this apparently sudden aging.  Here I walked her almost every single day since she became a member of this family, and I had missed what was right beneath my nose.

This all makes me a bit sad.  Ever since I was a little dog-loving girl, I'd wanted nothing more than to keep a dog for the entirety of its life.  To see it grow and play.  To escort it on visits to the vet -- someone on the James Herriott side of things.  To sleep with it.  Love on it.  All the way from a fluffy puppy to a graying regal elder of a dog.  I watched that dream slip away several times during my nomadic childhood with Bonnett leading the pack as my emotional favorite.  I helped her deliver her own babies when she was much too young.  Mother and puppies all had to go: my only consolation being their new home was a farm.  

But Panda, though she arrived well into her first year, has been a perfectly lovely and loving pet.  Docile.  Quick to take instruction.  She still sits and watches me until given the signal to eat, even when I perform several tasks to test her ability to resist the urge to chow down.  Though she is a licker, she is not a jumper.  And, she's been so very good with my kids.  We are her pack.  I am her beta; Jimmy's deeper voice still tucks her tail and lowers her head as she defers to his very presence, thus helping him to achieve alpha status.  However, we all know who walks her, brushes her, administers meds, and takes her to the vet.  She listens when I ramble on, talking to her, talking at her.  She is my mellow companion.  And lately, every time I check on her during her outdoor napping sessions, I find myself making sure she is still breathing.  Ensuring myself that she is yet alive.

Though everyone will miss her when she's gone, I feel fairly confident saying I will miss our blue-eyed girl the most.  Both for what she has been to us and what she represents of a girlhood now gone to me.  Until then, it's special recipe in the morning after her one-mile walk and as many afternoons in the humid heat of Murfreesboro as she can stand.