My Beloved Sheebah-Dog.
January 1996 (approx) - September 20, 2008.
My co-hort, confident & friend from March 22, 1996 to the end.
What can I say..... I had Sheebah before I had a husband, children, my own house....she was my sidekick.
Where I went, she went. My friends all knew that if I was there, Sheebah would be, too. No questions asked. She slept in my bed. Always my watchful bodyguard. Always up for a romp when I went horseback riding. Loved to swim, she could climb trees, she could sniff out & find just about anything I ever hid from her. Fetching was her passion. She could also tell the difference between whatever stick we'd been playing with & a different one and would not bring back the wrong one...even if I tried to trick her into playing with a different one. She'd bring back the remaining toothpick of the original stick and want me to throw it, but would refuse to fetch a
new one if I tried to replace the original; would search for that toothpick until she found it & I threw it again. She'd put her stick/ball wherever I told her to; If I said "put it here Sheebs" she'd place or toss it to wherever I was pointing. She knew the difference between her "ball" and a "stick" and would bring whichever I asked for.
One summer we went on a road trip to Wyoming together; just us two girls. She stayed in the hotel with me and sat in the passenger seat the whole trip. We had a great time!
She was a lab/hound cross "mutt" that I adopted from the humane society. She and her sister had been dumped in a ditch, and both were thin, scared puppies. Her sister had already been adopted when I went to look at dogs at the humane society. Just little pathetic Sheebs was left. When I saw her, I knew she was my girl & she came home with me that day.
When I had children of my own, it was sad to see Sheebah slip into the shadows of my life. And even harder to see her decline into the end of hers; getting sore, stiffer, more tired, more white on her muzzle. Her hearing went, her eyes turned grey. The hardest part was seeing an old friend dying....and knowing it was coming & nothing could be done about it. She was always there, ready & waiting for me when I did have extra time to play with her. But our romps & adventures were fewer & much further between. And
she couldn't keep up like she used to. Her arthritis made it difficult for her to get up or run for very long in the end.
She was a good & faithful friend; more loyal than any human I've even encountered.
Her passing is the end of an era for me. She was what was left of my teenage years. So hard to see both slip away.......and so time goes on.......
Always loved & always missed; there are some holes that can not be refilled.