Monday night Tosh bounced up to the back gate ready to go for a walk. He was energetic and happy, like the puppy he was and had always been for the past 12 years. I hadn’t taken him on my nightly walks with Chance for a couple of months because of a paw injury that had left him limping and in seeming pain. I thought for a moment of taking him but thought better of it as to not aggravate the injury that appeared to be better. No, I told him to stay, pet his head and watched him lay down next to the gate, waiting for us to return.
Tuesday morning I woke up at 5am like normal to get ready for work, only on this day I was sick and not going in. As I typed my email to work to let them know I wasn’t coming I noticed my two buddies, never failing, staring at me through the slider waiting for their morning acknowledgment. I gave them each a biscuit and went back to bed, not knowing it would be the last time I would pet that stupid bag of carpet and tell him what a good boy he was.
Of all the people in the world to be writing a sappy moment about a pet you would never in this lifetime think it would be me. I mean yes I have the “crying” gene as Stacy Fausset puts it. I cried when Old Yellar died, shoot I cried during some (okay all) of the Harry Potter movies, but generally I’m not an emotional guy when it comes to pets. I’m the same guy who when pressed with the choice to pick between $2500 exploratory surgery or $40 for putting the dog to sleep chose the latter. Same guy who flushes fish down the toilet, buries bunnies under plants, makes sure all pets are “outside” pets. Same guy who bristles at pet “check-ups” or expensive dog food with “real meat” in it. You know what I mean? I mean it is just a dog or a cat or a gerbil for that matter, right?
I mean the world today is in chaos, starving and disease in Africa, people killing themselves and countless others for Jihad, crazy weather, cancer and parents and children succumbing to cancer. I mean really if this is the “end of times” as my 91 year old Jehovah Witness Grandmother believes, where on the plane would you put mourning the passing of a dog? Not very high, right? Am I wrong to feel that way? Just don’t think about it, be a good Dad and be there for Aric and Mandy, right? Okay, I can do this.
12 years ago while Tina and I were doing our clothes in a laundry mat near our house in Oak View she and Mandy saw a post card on the board offering “free” puppies. We had recently brought home our first family pet from the humane society, a scrappy escape artist we named Bob “Marley” Marshall. I argued, “We just got a dog, why in the world would we need another.” As do most of my arguments they fell on deaf ears and before I knew it the girls had hooked me with a “let’s just take a look at them.”
The puppies were ¾ Golden Retriever and ¼ Cocker Spaniel (we would find out later the grown up version looked like a miniature Golden with a little curlier, a little redder coat). They bounded around the corner about 5-6 of them, all girls but for one. The last little chub rock that trailed the pack and stayed back out of the limelight. Of course that was the one Mandy wanted. Of course that was the one the lady said her kids were going to keep. At first, since they were only seven weeks old and not yet fully weaned, she said we’d have to come back in a week. I thought I’d been let off the hook, but Mandy’s face sunk and the lady caved and handed over the chubby little guy saying take him before my “kids get home.”
And so Marley got a brother, Pete “Tosh” Marshall and the Wailers began. They were two peas in a pod. Marley the sergeant instructing where the holes were to be dug, Tosh the soldier faithfully digging Marley’s every exit hole. Then he’d sit staring at his latest dig, waiting for Marley to come back, never figuring out why Marley always came back in my arms, thrown into the backyard in a heap, rather then through the hole he had dug for him. No matter, Tosh would always be there to lick Marley’s face and welcome him home. That was the beginning of the “Two Dog’s Mining Co.” and the many holes they would dig and shrubbery they would joyously destroy!
They would chase rabbits together when we’d take them down to the Old Kinko’s track to stretch their legs. They’d marvel and cower at the horses along the Ojai walking trail, thinking to themselves, what breed of dog is that? They were always together, day and night, rain or shine, through thick and thin. If Tosh was being neurotic like he mostly was and would sit in the rain howling at our house, Marley would bark at him. But when Tosh wouldn’t budge, Marley would come out of their house and stand next to him, in the rain, until they were both soaked and I had dragged Tosh into their house.
When Marley got sick and we had to put him down some six years back, Tosh rode along with his brother in the back of the truck for his final ride. Tosh was never the same after that ride. He didn’t want to ride in the truck anymore and his neurosis’ seemed to worsen. He would howl for no reason and seemed to age quickly. That was until about a year ago, when we brought home a “little” buddy (against my protests) named Chance. 100% Yellow Lab, 100% pain in the buttocks. Tosh became the boss for all of about 3 days then Chance took over. Chewing and destroying everything he could sink his teeth into, including Tosh at times.
Although Tosh looked at us with those eyes like, “thanks, just what I needed in my final time to be used as a stupid dogs chew toy and rag doll”, he did gain new life and the puppy in him had returned. I also noticed another thing when Chance came into our life; Tosh wasn’t the dumbest dog in the world! No, it wasn’t the return of Two Dog Mining Co. although I did notice Tosh seemed to be directing Chance with certain things. No, this was more like “One Dog Wrecking Co.” with Tosh the snickering foreman.
There was a new life in Tosh; an excitement in his eyes again, a bounce in his step. He wanted to run, to explore again, to play ball. He didn’t even seem to mind when Chance would tease him with branches from the trees in our backyard he had pulled down or would shred the new tennis balls within the first 10 minutes. No, he would be a little disappointed but would quickly get over it and off to a new adventure with his raucous new partner in crime.
A couple of months ago Tosh hurt his left front paw or arm and looked pretty bad. We didn’t know what had happened, maybe Chance played too rough, a neighbor thought they had fought a possum, who knows. With pain pills and senior food for his joints and (the worst part) no runs at night, Tosh had slowly recovered and I was almost ready to take him out again.
Monday night he was happily waiting for Chance and I as we returned from our walk. He ate a little, I noticed not his normal but didn’t think too much about it. Tuesday morning he took the biscuit like every other day, snatching it out of my hand like he hadn’t been fed in weeks, barely leaving my fingers intact.
That evening as I was picking up the dog mess and wondering why Chance kept poking at me and Tosh was no where to be found… I saw our beautiful doggy curled up in one of our wine barrels taking his final nap! It couldn’t have happened any more perfectly really; under a citrus tree with his head resting in a bed of thyme, he was gone. A smile on his white face, obviously he had found Marley and was chasing those rabbits in the doggy park above!
Today, with all of the things happening around us, economy in tatters, jobs uncertain, America at war I almost feel shameful to mourn a dog. But he was more than just a dog, he was part of our family, a vital limb that can’t be replaced and however sappy it seems, today I’m sad. Today I mourn for a dog…
Rest in Peace Pete Tosh Marshall 9/09/1996 – 9/30/2008
