The Death of a Dog
Watching a puppy grow into a dog is a most rewarding experience. Days fly by; days of catch in the park; days of long autumn walks. Little puddles on the floor and chewed-up shoes are all made worthwhile by the love of this little bundle of energy that’s been let into your home. Soon, these awkward creatures mature into full-grown dogs and we get to watch them go from pulling us down the streets to trotting peacefully at our ankles. When a dog does not get the chance to reach adulthood, one cannot help but feel sad about it. Watching my dog Sophie die short of two years old brought me to a greater understanding of what doghood truly is.
Watching those young years go by is an experience every dog owner cherishes. Sophie would wander playfully around the yard, doing everything imaginable other than coming inside when I wanted her to. Watching a Great Dane of six months' age gallop off after a new friend is a slightly frustrating experience, but one made beautiful by the mechanisms of memory. She would walk with her nose stuck to the ground, pulling every imaginable smell deep into her. That long, pink tongue of hers would pick up every morsel of food she found, and her impressive jaws found pleasure in every twig and every dead squirrel on every street in town. Her eyes sparkled with the exuberance of youth, and nothing seemed illogical or impossible to her; everyone was a friend.
When things began to change, it was not sudden. Small things happened, every one of which I attributed to "maturity." She no longer ran about outside, she no longer sought out new friends, no longer did sticks on the road hold any joy for her. "Well, finally she's grown up," I thought and continued walking. Soon days came when she had to be dragged out of the door to use the bathroom. She began to nap most of her days away. I had read that Great Danes were "relaxed," so I attributed every new quirk of hers to the slow trudging of time and maturity.
Then the day came when foresight collided head on with hindsight. I had gone on a trip to Minneapolis, and as I sat in the midst of a crowd of people waiting for a train, a call woke me from my observation. I do not remember what the person on the phone said, but I know that the next day I was back home and walking in the door to the veterinarian's office. There stood a big, skinny dog, its head craned awkwardly to the side, watching something on the floor. I looked at the veterinarian's face and saw his eyes and knew, immediately, that this was my dog. Her feet were placed awkwardly and her eyes didn't flick over to look at me. The veterinarian had said on the phone that Sophie had stopped eating and was in great danger. None of it made sense until I stood, quite alone, in the lobby of the veterinary clinic on Easter Sunday, keeping the doctor from his family.
As the doctor spoke words to me that meant very little, I took Sophie's leash and guided her outside. She walked strangely, not keeping a straight line very well. Soon she was on the grass, relieving herself pathetically. Her hindquarters came to rest on the ground afterwards, and her legs struggled to bring her back to her feet. It took her nearly twenty painful seconds to get back onto her feet. Her head turned again, and to my surprise, her eyes took on a wild quality. To her side was a patch of woods and she began pulling me, like she had once months ago, into the woods. A moment of relief was replaced by a black blanket of fear. I put my hand to my mouth and felt an ugly pool grow somewhere deep inside of me.
Who was this creature that stood before me? Something in her eyes, as they wildly made a break for the trees behind the clinic, seemed unsettlingly familiar. I knew her break as only the final, gasping breaths for relief before death. The blackness in my heart seemed then coming not from fear for my dog, but from some more sinister place. I reined Sophie back in, and pulled her closer to the clinic as the veterinarian continued speaking words I do not remember. The feral glint that horrified me left then, and was replaced by the old, glazed indifference I had seen in her when I first walked in the doors.
The same power that clenched my heart then seemed to come to rest upon the back of Sophie, as she started collapsing. There was something in her eyes that was familiar, still, to me, and I couldn't place it. It dawned on me, cold and finally, that Sophie was no longer Sophie. Sophie had become no less than death herself. The power of that thought overwhelmed me and my breath became shallower and more forced. "Come here," I said to the gray mass with four legs that stood in front of me then, hoping that something old and lost would emerge from the darkness that surrounded her. Nothing did. The dizziness I felt was indescribable. Come, I called, over and over again, come! The words, though, were only shadows.
I dragged her into the clinic again, and she came to rest in the middle of the sheer white, speckled floor. She stood in that unbalanced, precarious position again. I felt I could hear whispers coming from her mouth and her eyes and her ears. As the veterinarian stood behind me, silent and impatient, I only tried to conceal the look on my face. I hobbled over to Sophie's breathing body and brought my eyes center to hers. Only then did our eyes meet.
Oh, what a horrible proposition! How could I have faced what I knew was nothing less than death itself? What mischievous power compelled me to my knees then? I knew it was only my own undying vanity. I stared into those brown eyes, which barely held themselves open, and saw who I had become. I wanted, then, nothing more than the death of this creature, this crowd of molecules that taunted me with my own body. Its nose was crusted and dark matter dripped from its eyes. Its feet did not know where to stand. It could not bear the taste of food. When it bent over to relieve itself, it did not have the power to stand again. It saw the woods, the dark, the wild, and pulled against the hand it knew it couldn't command, desperately and vainly struggling towards the unreachable place of peaceful end.
I demanded a final solution for this beast I had once known. The veterinarian was apologetic but prepared. He placed the creature and I into a room together as he went to prepare it. Never had a room seemed so small as then! I could not run away, there was nowhere I could hide from the breathing carcass that stood in front of me then. If only she could have lay down! Then I could have found some solace that there was still life in front of me, still the normalcy of wanting to rest. But, no! It only stood, staring off at the wall again. It was not aware of my presence and yet every atom of its being called out to me!
When the doctor walked in, I found no relief. Still the creature's incessant standing, barely on the edge of falling over. The doctor held a syringe of transparent, blue liquid. The "final solution," he called it. I wanted to cry out, "just inject it already!" but I just sat, silently. "We're ready," he said to me. I complied; he must have interpreted the terrified look on my face as sadness as his gaze only settled on me for the briefest moment. He knocked the dog over, as gently as he could; but those legs had no desire for peace. The creature's face did not flinch. It was as if it criticized me from the precipice! No relief came as the needle plunged into its leg. I felt the inexplicable urge to put my hand on its chest, and I followed this urge. The doctor's thumb compressed the liquid and I saw as it trickled into the vein of this demon that lay before me.
Finally, a reaction came. The creature sucked in a giant breath and its heart beat in vain against the blue liquid that coursed into it. Deep breath after deep breath, the heart racing itself over the edge. Still no reaction from its face; I clenched my jaw and swore to myself. There—there it was. The breathing became labored, the heartbeat irregular. At last, it ended. The final breath, the final beat.
I moved away from the body as if in a dream. There was no horror left in my veins, but at the same time no relief. The motionless body that lay on the floor, I knew, was no longer alive. But in its stillness, the pain became the greatest. I began to weep and wanted to cry out "go away!" But, I knew that the corpse that lay in deceiving peace would haunt me. As I walked out of the door of the clinic, the specter of Sophie followed me and laughs at me, just beyond sight, to this day.
