The news from my neck of the woods
Edith Cook
Dear Friends and Readers,
Here is why you haven’t heard from me in a while: Not long ago a friend and I decided to become domestic partners. The shift has been momentous; both of us are yet caught up in trying to adjust.
My partner and his wife moved to Saratoga on retirement, having raised their children in Nebraska. After his wife’s passing, he tells me, he leaned on children and grandchildren for daily doses of support. He maintains ties with Nebraska through a lakeside camper, his base for spur-of-the-moment visits.
My kids grew up in California, where their dad died in 2003. After retirement I moved to Wyoming, where I lived in Cheyenne and rural Platte County before settling in Saratoga two years ago. I tend to visit children and grandchildren when I’m driven to escape Wyoming’s arctic cold. My partner tells me he enjoys Wyoming winters.
My partner and I shared a fondness for my dog Abby who, I’m sad to report, is no longer with us. I composed a tribute to her via the attached story, also “read in” below. In the published version, Abby's pic appears at outset; somehow I was unable to get it there.
I’ll be posting it on my website and Facebook page with some additional pics; meanwhile, I attach one from California, sent by Andy and family of Lola getting to know Abby.
Miss Edith
(Dr. Edith Cook)
Published in the Cheyenne Post on July 31, 2024. Editor’s Headline, A Dog’s Life and Ending.
Sometimes, life hands you a lemon too big to squeeze into lemonade. It happened to me when a veterinarian showed me an X-ray of Abby’s left foreleg gone lame.
Abby came to me about ten years ago. She was eighteen months old, and I was her fourth owner.
To say that her adolescence was traumatic would be an understatement. I learned about her on a Craigslist ad, “Free to Good Home.” Having lived solo for more years than I care to recount, and planning to move to the boondocks, I thought a sizable canine companion would be a good idea. Once I laid eyes on her, I was in love.
From the young man who posted the ad, I knew that Abby’s first owner spent time and attention during Abby’s life from puppy to adolescent. Abby went through an obedience class and was spayed. An identifying chip is embedded beneath the skin of her throat. At some point, Abby became too much for the woman. Too big? Too expensive to feed?
I only know, her owner passed her to a young couple. They kept her in a kennel while they were at work. Abby grew so distraught, she chewed a hole the size of my hand in the hard plastic kennel that kept her confined during daytime hours. That’s when the young man entered her life, but not for long. He developed a friendship with a young woman who owned a small dog that disliked Abby. It came down to, “Either Abby goes or we’re history.” The ultimatum gave rise to the young man’s ad that prompted me to act.
Abby’s first months in Cheyenne were difficult. Whenever someone opened the front door—usually my veterinarian son or his wife—she rushed past them and ran down the street. No amount of calling would bring her back. Sometimes, if I opened the gate to my backyard, she’d dash in there on the run, but I had to hide; if she saw me standing there, she would not come near the backyard gate; yet I had to slam the gate shut before she’d rush out again.
Other times, my son and I chased after her, leash in hand. She refused to listen when called. We’d catch her only when she lingered over a smell she wanted to investigate.
“This dog’s gonna get run over before you move,” said Walter on one such occasion. Yet Abby seemed to have the sense not to get near moving vehicles.
Once the house being built for me in rural Platte County neared completion, I put my Cheyenne home on the market. By this time Walter and his spouse, having accepted positions in Texas too good to turn down, headed for the wild blue yonder with their tween daughter. A few months later, Abby and I moved also.
Abby loved her new environment—loved it too much. Daily she ran on the acreage, a former wheat farm reverting to grassland, until she returned, exhausted. She even ran herself lame. She accepted me as the person who filled her food dish; still, she remained wary of people.
“Give her ibuprofen at bedtime,” suggested my son. But medicating her only ensured she ran again the next day until she came home limping.
“You’ll have to let her figure out her limitations,” said Walter Eventually Abby reined in her excesses. Time was, she couldn’t bear to be touched; this changed as she got used to my home and my presence.
Abby loved to travel in my car, where she stretched herself out on the backseat. Besides our wintery trips to Texas, we visited California whenever my youngest and spouse asked me to stay with their school-aged son and daughter. The parents both work for the same Silicon Valley tech company, for which they staff a weeklong conference. Abby got along well with Lola, the family’s yellow lab.
Another time Abby and I traveled to Idaho for a grandson’s college graduation and army induction. His brother, who lives in Salt Lake City, helped drive us. He’d grown up with labs, and so, the young man entertained Abby whenever we stopped at a park or rest area.
Not long ago, the parents of the college graduate and the Salt Lake son stayed with me on their way to moving from Idaho to South Dakota. They brought with them their two labs, litter mates to Lola. Naturally, Abby enjoyed my visitors as much as I did.
Back to the X-rays of last week. “I’m sorry to tell you,” the animal doctor said as she pointed to a badly swollen section of Abby’s bum leg, “this indicates bone cancer.” The swelling was so diseased, the bone was turning to “mush.” Amputating the leg was an option, she added, which might extend her life by months, perhaps longer.
“I won’t put her through that,” I said, “if it comes down to euthanasia anyway.”
The young woman nodded sympathetically.
I mentioned my veterinarian son in Texas, where Abby and I spend time in winter. Walter and his family visit us whenever they return to Wyoming in the summer.
“If your son would like to see the X-rays,” she said, “I’ll email them to him.”
Then she sent Abby home with me, handing me a bottle of antibiotics and pills to relieve her pain. Walter then telephoned her and they discussed Abby’s prognosis.
“She sent me the X-rays,” he told me later. “I think she is right.”
Despite the pills, Abby continued to limp, refusing to put weight on the diseased leg. She who used to love running, just wanted to lie down.
Since Abby loves swimming in a dog-paddle kind of way, after her diagnosis, my partner and I brought her to a sun-warmed lake in Nebraska. Abby only took quick dips into the water, then hobbled back to the car, wanting to return to her backseat pad. We cut short our Nebraska sojourn and returned to Wyoming. Abby seemed relieved to be home. To our chagrin, she refuses to touch her food. My partner and I will have to part with Abby sooner than we thought. I hate to imagine it, but the day will come when we return to the vet—and leave without our pooch.
Losing a beloved companion, even a non-human one, reminds us of earlier losses. My partner lost all four of his siblings, several of them very early, which was the case in my life also. He saw a dear friend and hunting partner die of complications with Alzheimer’s while I told of Annfried, a former school friend turned colleague in the translation department of Weise & Monski. In an era before cell phones, Annfried was found dead in her home at fifty, of a heart condition no one suspected.
I still own a photo of the four of us—Annfried with her politician husband; I with my American spouse—on the beach of Grover City. How young we were then, how unaware of the tragedies to come!
Sometimes, my partner and I recount to each other past sorrows and griefs, which makes for tearful conversations. As oldsters, we also know that one of us will leave the other behind, a thought that weighs heavy on our hearts. Nevertheless, knowing Abby brought joy into our lives. It seems, just yesterday she was with us in the Snowy Range, where she veered off the trail for a swim in the (no doubt frigid) waters of Lewis Lake.
Patti Sherlock
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Stefanie Possel
Dear Edith,
this news brings both sadness and joy. I am delighted that you have chosen to spend your life with your neighbor. May the two of you find happiness together.
Thank you for sharing your dog's life with us. I believe she found great happiness with you.
Warm regards,
Stefanie Possel
t12...@wbaccess.net
Dear Edith,
All the best.
Tom
“Hold back the pruning hook, for the bird of happiness seeks a branch as we climb the tree.”
(Warren Wendover: Plans and Other Miscalculations; Introduction: “Reading the Signs.”)
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