3am Friday morning. I’ve just come in from digging a grave.

Just over three years ago I got a black lab puppy. He was just about a month old and had a hard start to his life. His mother was rescued from a puppy mill by some very good people who cared for her and loved her and shortly after she died. The litter she was carrying was quickly sectioned and pulled into the world. The last of them had some serious injury to his face. It made his snout grow a little crooked and one eye looked too large. He was not soon adopted. My mother new his mother and decided that he should come to live in the Midwest with me. Several phone calls and a 12 hour drive later this tiny happy obscenely sweet creature had moved in to my home. We got along really well. He learned well and was the single happiest being I have ever known.

About three months later I had to have my tonsils out. An “easy” operation, over in just an hour with only a few weeks to recover, all did not go as planned. Two years, seventeen operations later and I’ve re-learned how swallow, can eat solid food again and while my voice will never be the one I had known this one is ok. Through the thousands of hours of pain, the pre and post surgery illnesses, drug induced delirium and my general happy nature my dog loved me. He never once strayed. He came to my side when the pain made me cry out. He walked by my side on the half mile torture treks that I had to make to get strong enough for the inevitable next surgery. He didn’t care when after having to drink my meals for a year I lost so much weight that many people would not have recognized me. I remember after having blacked out from pain waking on the floor of the living room with Doyle licking my face and crying until I was able to stand. My dog loved me. It has only been the last few months that my world has become even a little normal. Doyle didn’t know me as a healthy person until just recently. Along the way Doyle’s sister Jackie came into our home. He needed a dog just as much as I did.

Our little farmhouse has been getting a cleanup and sprucing lately. It was time to fix three years of neglect and wipe away the last vestiges of illness. The chair that I had to sleep in for over two years needed to be moved and the chair right next to it that Doyle slept in was left near the window. My dog loved me. He thought all of it was a great adventure. They both loved it when I was able to sleep in a bed again it meant that we all got to sleep in a bed. Two enormous black labs and a big bald guy…often with a cat chaser all snoring along contentedly.

Thursday morning Doyle went outside to play for a bit before the sun came up. An hour later when I went to bring him in he was hiding across the yard and even at fifty feet it was clear that he was in serious distress. A rushed trip to the vet, emergency surgery, a 50/50 shot, and a long and awful day. At one A.M. the overnight clinic called to say that things had gone very, very wrong. It was only going to get worse they said and he was in so very much pain. I told him how he had helped save me. I told him how much I loved him. I held my friend when he died.

He is home now, just outside, across from the front door between the two really good squirrel trees. Jackie shook and cried when I placed her brother in the ground. After it all when he needed me to help him get better all I could do was ease the pain and end his life. There is nothing right or fair about that. I will mourn my friend. I miss my dog.