More Than Just a Dog

I’ve had dogs all my life. I know the score. You get attached to them, and when they die, it’s a little like losing a member of the family. But Trent was different. He was a little more than just a dog.

The first I took him to the country vet in our little town, they knew he was more than just a dog. They could tell by the hair in his ears, the line of his jaw. They weren’t surprised or appalled – and they didn’t tell me, like the first vet I took him to for shots, in the city, that I should lie (well, evade the truth, at least) and say on his record that he was a “part German Shepherd.” 

Our local vet knew what he was, and didn’t mind a bit. In fact, one of the vet assistants raised wolf hybrids, too, and thought he was a beautiful specimen. And he was. See, Trent was one of a very special litter of wolf puppies that my hybrid, Diana, gave birth to in 1991, and saved my life. Or at least my sanity.

That was, to put it nicely, a very bad Christmas. I was divorced and out of a job; a few months before I’d ended the first relationship I’d had after a horrific ten year marriage to an alcoholic, and I’d left a job I loved because of an untenable management and political situation. I was about as low as I’ve even felt in my life. I cried for a month, wrote a lot of very dark poetry, and wondered if life was ever going to be worth living again.

And then Diana got pregnant. I wasn’t sure I could stand one more thing right then, but when those pups were born, the Miracle of Life reached out and grabbed me and brought me back from that scary place where I’d been teetering on the edge for weeks, and made me smile again. There were eight gorgeous little creatures, spilling all over each other in my kitchen floor. My kids were enthralled, and so was I. We took care of the babies, and my battered and broken heart healed.

We each had our favorites, and my little boy (he was little back then) latched on to the biggest pup of the lot, and named him Trent. When the pups were old enough to sell, he talked his grandpa into taking Trent so we wouldn’t sell him. Dad and Kris bought a doghouse that was much too big for him then, and Kris proudly painted “Trent” in crooked white letters above the door.

And the puppy grew into a dog, and grew into his house. In his prime, he weighed about 100 pounds. I didn’t weigh much more than that at the time, and he was a handful. But he was Daddy’s dog, and my dad spoiled him almost as much as he’d spoiled his only daughter (me). Dad was proud of that dog, showing him off to other people whenever he got the chance. And Trent was fiercely protective of Daddy, and the rest of us. He could put on a mean front, but with us, he was a great big baby. Always afraid of thunder, he would cower in his house during stormy weather. But when the sun came back out, he’d be standing on top of his house, his tail wagging.

When Dad died, for months afterward, Trent’s ears would perk up when one of us would drive daddy’s truck up in the driveway. I don’t think he ever completely stopped watching and waiting and for Dad to come home.

A few months after Daddy’s death, one day we found Trent bleeding from the nose in the back yard. Somehow or another, we got him into the car and took him to the vet. They told us he had heartworms, and that the treatment was expensive and only had a fifty-fifty chance of working. As if there were any question about giving it a try. He was my daddy’s dog, and I’d just lost my father; I was not going to let his dog die if I could possibly prevent it.

And he rallied, and in six months he was his old self again. I felt a little less anxious about mom being there by herself because Trent was there. They sort of took care of each other.

A little over a month ago, mom had a heart attack and was hospitalized for several weeks. I went over to feed Trent each day, and pet him and play with him a little. He came running when he saw me, as if to tell me how lonely he’d been.

Mom got back home, but soon after, Trent stopped eating one day. It was a typical Texas summer, and I thought maybe it was just the heat. I poured him a tub full of water, and he got in it, giving me a grateful look. But the next day he didn’t eat either, and he didn’t come running when I went out to feed him. He was moving way too slowly. I knew something was wrong, but I had to take mom to the doctor. I made plans to take Trent to the vet the next day if he wasn’t better.

My son stayed with mom that night, and the next morning he called and woke me up, to tell me Trent was dead. We buried him in the back yard where two of the dogs I grew up with were buried, near the doghouse with his name in crooked white letters across the front.

I cried a lot that day.

I want to think that he’s with Daddy again, someplace where’s there’s no thunder, and no heartworms, and no need to lie about what he is. But every time I drive up in mom’s driveway, I look toward the fence where he was always waiting, and I miss that big old dog who was more than just a dog.