dog daze

I am so sorry to say this but we lost Darby a few months back, our Silver Shepherd. She died at the vet, believe it or not, after we had left her for some overnight treatment, without a proper goodbye from us, unfortunately. A bit heartbreaking, to say the least.

She saw us through so much in our eleven years together. We got her during a particularly tough spell for us after we had lost both Donna’s mom and our collie, Nicely, in a period of just a few months. The kids relished the whole process of selecting her from the litter – we chose her because she seemed more obsessed with the ball than any of her brothers and sisters. The smiles on the faces of our kids, aged 13, 11 and 9, in our photos from that time period demonstrate that she executed the chief task we had asked of her to perfection. She would be called upon soon to do that again for us a few years later.

She saw us through a challenging move for all of us from Almaden to El Segundo, and she made the transition to a smaller house and yard without any apparent resentment. A year and a half later we rocked this California dog’s world by moving again, this time to Connecticut mid-winter. We could literally hear her barking in her crate both before and during the flight, as shocking as that sounds. But I like to think the additional move was worth the pain, as we eventually secured for her a huge yard and an inviting woods full of adventure to explore nearby in our new place in Newtown. She adjusted quicker than any of us and then provided a source of joy as we each came to fall in love with the new area just as she had.

Years later of course she mourned as hard as we did when the kids one by one left for college, but she celebrated even more vociferously than us whenever they returned.

She was so, so smart. At first she would chase the deer off our yard and for a half a mile through the woods and neighborhood. But she soon learned what property was ours and what wasn’t and then honored that remarkably well. During any season of the year – and boy do we have seasons in Connecticut – I could simply open the door to the garage, hit the button to open the garage door, and she would instinctively dart down the stair case, fly through the garage and gallop into the backyard to patrol her territory, try to track any of the dozens of animal life that may have been stirring, or just run around releasing some pent up energy. After ten minutes or so she would simply come back up on her own, unprompted. It didn’t matter if it was midsummer on the hottest day of the year, or ten degrees out with two feet of snow on the ground. She was really remarkable that way – and never needed an electric fence. (That was really appreciated on those bitter cold days.)

You could tell she was a herder at heart – which she practiced with me all the time – even in the house. She was forever walking in front of me and anticipating where I would be going, all the while looking back to make sure I was still following. And her instincts as to where I was going were almost always right. She was so smart that way.

And she needed people. She preferred the company of people to dogs, to say the least, and needed to be at our side constantly – unless she was chasing something, which she did often. She once leapt through the screen of a window on our second floor to chase a deer who had the audacity to be passing through her backyard. Trees and bushes broke her fall, and she emerged unscathed. Perhaps she was so smart she knew that she could use the plants to provide a cushion in that manner for her descent. I like to think that was the case.

So smart, as loyal as can be, energetic, protective and loving – everything you want in a dog and then some. We still miss her dearly, but we are forever grateful for those eleven years and the profound impact she had on all of us at precisely the right time in our lives.