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Tribute to Finn - our pets are with us for such a short time
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Finn relaxing at home with Neil, summer 2000.
Today, my friend Nancy Bennett faces one of the saddest days that any of us have to bear – the loss of her Whippet, Finn. The death of a beloved pet leaves such an empty place in our lives. It is a lonely sort of grief.
Finn was elderly; 15 years old, which is 105 in human years using the usual calculation. He had been doing well. In fact, just two months ago, Nancy accidentally left him in the backyard when she went to pick up the kids at school. Nancy said, “He jumped the fence and walked over to our neighbors two houses away. They have a half-Greyhound/half Whippet named Seamus. He did something to attract their attention (don't know what) and they opened the door and let him in and he walked over and got into Seamus' bed and stayed there until I got home and they called me!”
Only a very healthy and very clever dog could do that. Those of us who have Whippets love that they are so long-lived. When one of our top breeders, Mary Dukes, was told by an owner that his Whippet was almost 18, she replied (with her dry sense of humor), “They just forget to die.”
It’s a healthy breed. Finn’s departure sounds much like that of my dear Abby’s. He was fine in the morning, but around noon, could not stand up. Nancy said, “… His legs could not hold his weight up. If you tried to get him to stand, he just sank back down. I put heating pads and worked with him for about five hours. After a short phone consultation with the vet we decided that there really was nothing else to try and no point in forcing him to lie in bed with his bladder bursting with no prospect of ever standing up again. He was 4 months shy of 15 years old and up until 12:30 today was actually having a great life. He was not depressed or in pain in any way and was very alert, interested, and full of life right up until the end. He's actually the only dog I've ever had that didn't suffer at all at the end of his life."
Finn and I had a history. Nancy let him stay at my house last year when she went on vacation. One of those awful moments; the front door was open, no one was watching; Finn walked out. It was evening. I knew which direction he had gone because my dogs stood at the fence, staring into our neighbor’s backyard. But Finn wasn’t there. He had kept on walking, so I did, too, but couldn’t find him anywhere. I couldn’t believe it. Nancy often looks after my Whippet and this had never happened to her.
After tramping through every yard within a mile, calling his name, notifying police, animal control, neighbors with dogs, and all the vet hospitals, there was still no sign of Finn. At about midnight, I made the dreaded call to tell Nancy what happened. “I think he is in one of my neighbor’s houses,” I said. “If anything had happened to him, we would know.”
Of course, I expected Nancy to be frantic and panicked, as I was, but instead, she remained calm. She said, “Losing your dog is not the worst thing that can happen. Losing someone else’s dog is the worst thing that can happen.”
The story had a happy ending. Finn had stopped a car in the middle of Pennington-Rocky Hill Road. He jumped in and the kind family took him home. They immediately called the phone number on his collar and left a message on Nancy’s answering machine at her empty house. They fed him hamburger and steak and wrapped him in warm blankets and told him not to worry, they would take care of him until his owner was found. Their nine-year-old daughter was in favor of not ever giving him back.
When I showed up the next morning to pick him up, he said, “I like it just fine here, thank you.” He was very reluctant to come with me. I did a lot of blanket wrapping and hamburger and steak feeding to try to cheer him up. He put up with me, but made it very clear that his heart belonged to Nancy and no one else.
Today, at this sad moment, Rudyard Kipling’s poem, The Power of the Dog, seemed particularly apt. I forwarded it but Nancy had already read it to her ten-year-old son, Neil.
She said, “I like the poem because, unlike a lot of poems about dogs, it doesn't make me cry, and yet it’s so true. Given all the sorrows we have to go through with human beings, why are we willing to add to our sorrows by getting attached to dogs? And yet, we've apparently been doing it for at least 10,000 years. The other interesting thing is that he refers to "the 14 years that nature permits" -- and 100 years later with all our modern medicine, 14 years is still pretty much all that nature permits.”
Here’s a poem that will comfort you and make you smile. Our dogs are special, but they are with us for such a short time.
The Power of the Dog
There is sorrow enough in the natural way
From men and women to fill our day;
Why do we always arrange for more
Brothers and sisters, I beg you beware
Of giving your heart to a dog to tear.
Buy a pup and your money will buy
Love unflinching that cannot lie--
Perfect passion and worship fed
By a kick in the ribs or a pat on the head.
Nevertheless it is hardly fair
To risk your heart to a dog to tear.
When the fourteen years which Nature permits
Are closing in asthma, or tumor or fits,
And the vet's unspoken prescription runs
To lethal chambers or loaded guns,
Then you will find--it's your own affair--
But...you've given your heart to a dog to tear.
When the body that lived at your single will
When its whimper of welcome, is stilled (how still!)
When the spirit that answered your every mood
Is gone--wherever it goes--for good,
You will discover how much you care,
And will give your heart to a dog to tear.
We've sorrow enough in the natural way,
When it comes to burying Christian clay.
Our loves not given, but only lent,
At compound interest of cent per cent.
Though it is not always the case, I believe,
That the longer we've kept them, the more do we grieve:
For, when debts are payable, right or wrong,
A short-term loan is as bad as a long--
So why in Heaven (before we are there)
Should we give our hearts to a dog to tear?
- Rudyard Kipling (1885-1936)
“We love you Finn -- you were never a champion in the field or the ring, but
you were a champion in our hearts.” ---- Nancy
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