An Ode to Max

Well, no pictures today. I don't have any current pictures of our 13 year old dog, Max. Max was a lab, golden retriever, husky mix. I took one look at Max and said, "he is going to be a big dog". But he was so loveable and furry. He was more like a great big cub bear than a puppy. However, we took that great big fur ball puppy home. He was so cute! Having a dog prepares you a little for having children. I knew with how my husband treated Max that our children were going to be well spoiled. Once when my husband was gone for the weekend, I had to go outside with curlers in my hair because he refused to go outside without being on the leash.

And then we had one, two, and three children and yet there was a fourth, Max. After we would get the children down for the evening and think, ok, now we can relax but no there was Max ready for his turn to have some attention. Can you blame the poor baby? Where does an 80 pound dog fit in with three young children? Well, he did and we made it through and so the family was growing up and some growing old.

We had him for six months when he ran through the snow one day and hurt his hip and at nine months of age we were told that he had hip problem and we were told he would need surgery. Other than that, he was in pretty good shape throughout his life.

Well the past year has been difficult. He started having trouble walking and some other issues. We recently went on vacation and when we picked him up he had had issues while at the vet/kennel. We thought he was doing better but this morning when I came downstairs I noticed he was really sick. Well, had places to go and then came home to check on him and he was gone.So that was that. We said our good-byes and took care of what needed to be done and here we are back home trying to forget the day that is thankfully behind us.


Linda