Just do a little blog back track, I quote the Beatles when I'm down.
I was intending to do a "Things That Make Me Say Yeay" post today, but I just don't have it in me. I found out yesterday that my Maddie Moo was dead. Dad got up Saturday morning and decided me needed to find her, he didn't think anyone else was going to. And he did, he found her. The funny part is that Friday night while we we're in that worship service balling our eyes out like we had lost everything we ever had, Jeremy looked at me and told me he knew she was close to the house. She was, she was very close to the house. The fuzzy details of how she got out and everything that happened between Thursday night and my Dad finding her are what upset me the most. She didn't have to die. She was 4, almost 5. Perfectly healthy. She never ran away, once after the hurricane she accidentally got into the cane field and it took an hour to find her, but in 5 years that was the only time she was ever out of my protection.
I'm from a family who rescues dogs, loves dogs, cares for dogs. I have a cousin who use to breed and show dogs. I have another cousin who actually opened a no kill animal rescue in North LA. All that to say, I'm from dog people. This might be breaking my heart so badly because under my, and my family's care, we've never lost a dog. In my life I've had two other dogs - Buffy from when I was three to Jr High who died of old age, and Sammie who died shortly before I got Ellie who also died at the age of 9 of cancer and kidney failure. Both of those pups didn't die because of any careless mistake we made. Maddie didn't die because of anything I did, or Jeremy. Old Ellie is going to be 7 this year. She has never been out of my sight. Once in Monroe she got out while we were at work, she sat at our front door waiting on us to get home and barking at the walkers. But Maddie tried to come home, and when she came home an unfamiliar face ran her into the field my Dad found her in. Had we known she were out we could have said what to do. But we didn't. I have yet to walk out of this house and look at the little grave that was dug. I'm so afraid Ellie will smell her and try to dig her up.
Jeremy and I have spent years saying how we didn't know what we'd do when Ellie died and left Maddie alone, because, well, Ellie is older; it would make sense she die first. Maddie was so dependent on Ellie she would have died from sheer sadness. Ellie actually stayed in bed with us last night, which is so unlike her. She usually is Mrs. Freedom and does whatever she wants. She isn't dependent on me. Maddie on the other hand stalked us like it was her job. If you put her in bed you had to fight to get her out. Getting her up earlier than usual was a treat, she would moan and groan all the way out of the door, and when you sat her dog she looked like the stiff little bag of protest that she was, she honestly lived under covers. I just feel like she was taken too early. I can't grieve her loss appropriately because of her age and how she died. Had we been home, or had I taken her to Vidalia like I've done every other time of my life, none of this would have happened.
Just as a warning you may be getting funny stories of Moo Bear for awhile now, it is how I grieve.
