In Memory of Blue Eyes

The Texas triumvirate started to unravel when Herbie started spending more time at his owner’s house, mostly because as much as I was really beginning to warm up to dogs, Herbie just couldn’t behave inside our house. I have no idea what he did in his person’s house. Maybe the guy had a doggie commode (my guess is one wouldn’t have been enough. And how did Bob ever train that dog to use a commode?).  But there was no way that canine was coming back inside our new house.

Blue Eyes and White Boy spent most of their nights staying warm inside our place. They were both well behaved. Okay, White Boy wasn’t so much well-behaved because he was just a nice little doggie (the vet referred to his lineage as “lab mixed with something with short legs”), but he was scared of his own, or anyone else’s, shadow. And he was such a whiner. He would make such a racket when one of us drove up after working all day. No, not barking, exactly. More like a bark combined with a horrific howl that would normally attribute to a wolf in dire pain. Our guess was that Herbie’s person, who claimed White Boy was his dog, didn’t really give a damn about the white dog living in his house and just ignored him except when it was convenient. That poor dog’s spirit wasn’t so much broken as it was eaten away by neglect. As an example of this, his dry food was left outside, where White Boy was mostly relegated to. This would be okay, except here in Texas we get fire ants in abundance, and fire ants especially like meat. Of course White Boy had to eat his dinner with the uninvited dinner guests in attendance. Blue eyes suffered much the same fate, but was never affected in the same way. We think that the latter simply took care of herself more than White Boy did.

Blue Eyes had a ton of character, and was incredibly smart, as I alluded to in a previous posting. Her e is the best illustration of this: our newly acquired land was formerly farmland, and as such still had the irrigation terraces. Every afternoon Herbie would trot over to our place from his person’s house. At least the dog, obnoxious though he was, knew who his friends were and enjoyed their company; no, not us, but White Boy and Blue Eyes. And every day Blue Eyes would see him coming before Herbie saw her, and every day Blue Eyes would crawl on her Belly to just behind the top of one of the terraces. At just the right time Blue Eyes would jump out and terrify Herbie so dramatically I could swear I saw his ghost leap out from Herbie for just a few seconds. It was like watching a Merry Melodies cartoon. Herbie either never figured it out or enjoyed being scared out of whatever wits he had left. I’m pretty sure it was the former. Herbie was not the shiniest penny in the piggie bank..

Well, Blue Eyes met a very untimely fate. One Thursday evening, while dusk was fading to black, we called Blue Eyes in for the night. No response. Several calls later we finally figured since it was such a soft night out Blue Eyes had simply decided to enjoy the temperate weather. After all, despite her getting food and shelter within our humble home, she was accustomed to fending for herself.

The next day was rainy. I came home from work to see Pat and Barry coming from somewhere in the back of the house. I’d found out that Blue Eyes had not decided to spend the night outside, but had in fact gone for a swim. She’d gotten bitten by a snake and had tried to make it home. Our poor Blue Eyes had made it to within a couple hundred yards from the house. My wife and best friend buried her where she succumbed.

That was a few months after we had moved to Texas. We have never forgotten her, and she will always be remembered.

Herbie moved away with his person a year later. And White Boy was officially turned over to us after his previous person was nearly cited for letting the dog run wild. White Boy lived to the ripe old age of about 20, living with us to the end. He was happy, if a bit cantakerous.

I will tell you more as this year unfolds. Until my next posting, take care of yourself and those you care about. They may be the only people to keep you sane.

This entry was posted on 2. January 2010 at 03:52 and is filed under you're a blogger? You should be ashamed. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.