So, Yesterday Was Rough. We Had To Say Goodbye To Our Elderly Beagle, And Even Knowing That The Day Was

So, yesterday was rough. We had to say goodbye to our elderly beagle, and even knowing that the day was inevitable it still hurt to say goodbye.

Long story of her life under the cut, I’m not going into detail of what happened yesterday in this post.

Sophie came to us about five years ago. Someone had dumped her along with another beagle on our street, which is a wooded area in the middle of nowhere. She came up to us and was very friendly, if somewhat timid. It was clear that she used to have a collar, but it was gone. All her nails were overgrown to the point of curling over, intestinal worms, ear infections, about half the teeth in her mouth were rotten- she was in pretty bad shape and whoever had these dogs before just dumping them in the woods to fend for themselves did not take good care of them. We also suspect she had been used to breed puppies, it could have been a puppy mill situation but we’ll never know for sure what all happened in her past. We were told that she was at least 10 years old, and the other beagle we suspected was one of her pups.

We worked with a rescue group to find homes for the beagles, we had no plans to keep them because we already had two dogs and typically preferred larger dogs because, middle of wilderness, don’t want a hawk or something flying off with your dog. Before they could be put up for adoption, both the beagles needed to be spayed/neutered. When the vet spayed Sophie they also removed all her horribly rotten teeth because good lord they were in HORRIBLE shape. She’s groggy the first few days after, my mom worries the old girl won’t make it. One morning when my dad has her out front on a leash she catches scent of a rabbit and tries to track it down, howling.

Once Sophie recovered from the surgery it was like she was a whole new dog. She would run around the back yard, go so fast she couldn’t stop at the shorter staircase so she would just tuck and roll her sausage-shaped body down the steps, off the porch, then take off running without missing a beat upon reaching the ground. She would also outright jump from the upper deck to the lower deck, because who has time for stairs. About gave my mom a heart attack, and that is why we now have chicken wire around our top deck.

We found a home for the younger beagle, but in the end we just could not part with Sophie. My mom had grown very attached, and it’s always hard to find a home for an older dog anyway. She had made herself at home with us.

One time a small kitten had gotten into the fenced in area of our back yard. I alerted my older sister, and while she tried to approach the kitten I attempted to get all the dogs inside to stop antagonizing the poor thing. We were mostly worried about the bigger dogs, specifically our pit mix because he was high-energy and exciteable. Well, I managed to get the big dogs inside, but Sophie was still out in the yard. The kitten took off running, and Sophie immediately gave chase going as fast as her stubby legs could take her. The kitten ran to one side of the yard, hit the fence, then turned and bolted across the yard, over the lower deck, to the other fence- all the while our old, short, fat beagle running faster than we’ve ever seen her run, legs a blur but still nowhere near fast enough to outrun the kitten but she wasn’t letting that stop her fun. The kitten the bolts to where it had started, climbed over the fence, and never returned to our yard again. (I’m pretty sure I’ve seen that cat chilling out at a house further up the road, for those worried about that poor kitten). 

Sophie LOVED food, absolutely lived for meal times. We had to start feeding our dogs on a schedule because we noticed (after the younger beagle went from scrawny to sausage) that the beagles could not tell when they were full. They just. Kept. Eating. Well, once while we were out and about our cat, who’s food and food dish we keep on a table to keep the dogs from eating his food, got bored and knocked a full, unopened bag of cat food off his table. We got home late that day, after their usual meal time. Well, during that time one of the dogs looked at the cat food bag and, hey, smells like food! (we suspect it was Penny the then puppy, Sophie hardly had teeth and Cocoa isn’t food driven.) The dogs get into the cat food, they eat at least two thirds of the bag. Sophie was bloated, the high-protein cat food was a bit much for her system, but for once she was full and she no doubt would have done it again in a heartbeat. That was the only other time she would not accept food.

And oh goodness, she was a gassy dog. Incredibly gassy, like a cloud of farts was wearing a dog disguise. Gas relief medicine would help some, but even then she’d still fart at a near constant rate. Mostly it was just noisy, like she was a walking sitcom gag or something, sometimes she’d stink you out of a room. If you ask me it was part of her charm.

We had her for five years. She was at least 15, maybe older. It was amazing that, despite all the hardship she had endured, she managed to live for so long. I like to think that she wanted to stay with us for as long as we could, because she had finally found a loving home with us. And she fought to make the most of the time she had... even when her time ran out.

The owls do not know you. Sleep well: they, too, have teeth.

what kind of owl has teeth. Is...is it a dino owl? ...note to self, draw a dino owl.

“The secrets do not know you. Prepare: they’ll whisper you your fate.”

Just a little bored morbid here. What’s yours?

I mean I'd be mad too if someone with a spear tried to take my angel away

To be fair, she didn’t pull out her spear and grab Sans until Papyrus launched his first attack at them. Before they were just talking.

This is what happens when you make assumptions, kids!

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OKAY. Gonna work some more on the next Rebornfell page!

Quick doodle because I adore these background characters and wanted to draw their swapverse selves. 

YOUR DRAGON NAME

last two letters of your first name

middle two letters of your last name

first two letters of your mother’s name

last letter of your father’s name

mine would be Urlelan. Reblog and tag this with yours!