In remembrance of Goofy

Goofy is gone.

We held off the decision long as we could. But the inevitable deterioration of age became too great. Her pretty brown eyes grew clouded with cataracts. Her formerly strong back legs lost muscle tone. Whereas she once leaped vertically like an NBA star (Great Dane style) , the day had come when she struggled to rise at all.

And then she began to fall, and she needed help to stand again. She lost weight. Tumors appeared on her chest and her ribs showed despite the huge amount of food she ate.

I kept thinking, once spring is here, she will feel better, but at last we faced the truth. She was not going to get better. She was past thirteen and she was tired and hurting.

We called the vet who came to the house. We all petted Goof and talked to her and fed her peanut butter sandwiches and told her that it was okay, she could go on without us. I held her head on my knee and stroked her face. “Good girl, Goofy,” I said softly as the needle slipped into her vein.

She gave a little sigh and closed her white eyelashes for the last time. I felt her grow still and cold.

The house feels so empty now. The living room looks huge. Goof’s pillows and blankets are gone from in front of the woodburner. She used to lie so close to it that her toenails would occasionally turn off the blower.

We buried her with two blankets and several pillows, in the asparagus row where she used to hide among the feathery ferns and peer out into the main garden to watch me weed. I don’t suppose another dog will ever love me so unconditionally.


Kara said that Goofy could hear my car coming south on M-99 and it is true that she would always be at the door as I came in each afternoon. That is when her day began too.

I will remember: how she barked whenever Rick put his arm around me, how eager she was to go for a walk on any occasion, how she ran like a carousel horse with a funny little prancing gait, how she loved peanut butter, how she backed onto my lap and sat down when I sat on the couch, how she leaned against me wanting a scratch, how she would head butt you softly if you forgot her presence, and how beautiful she was…a Harlequin with black and gray and white markings and a feminine head and the sweetest disposition.

Thirteen years before, Kara and I scooped her out of a litter of black brothers and sisters. She buried her little pink nose in my neck and from that day on, she was my faithful friend and companion.

She’s gone ahead now. I can imagine her waiting on the Rainbow Bridge for my footstep. For how can heaven be heaven without Goof’s joyous welcoming bark?