We Had Some Good Times

It was Christmas time... that's when Mother put a small, fuzzy Rottweiler puppy on Father's bed. His present. Greta. Her name took a couple of weeks to come up with. She's a pure bred German Rottweiler, so we wanted a German name. We started with Kayla. Greta seemed to fit better.

She was the runt of the litter, Mother said. We could fit her in the pockets of our winter coats when we took her places. Sibling and I had to watch her at night over winter break... When she was old enough, we hired a trainer, got her all trained up... she knows 'sit' and 'lay down' and 'go to bed'... over time we'd ask questions and she'd figure out that they led to things she wanted like 'Do you have to go outside?', 'Want a treat?', 'Wanna go for a walk?'.

Then she had a stroke and an embolism shot down her spine and destroyed the nerves in her right hind leg. Then, we discovered through her genetics she did not have a socket in her hip on the left side, so her leg bone and her hip bone were just scraping together, unconnected. Now, my puppy-minded dog couldn't run without injury.


She seemed to get better though, which was great. Her spirit was high - is high. In her mind, she's still so young. Her body is her downfall. She's sliding on the floors she used to walk fine on, she can't see because of glaucoma and allergies, and all she wants to do is play.

There is nothing more we can do for her. Under the play in her eyes, it's easy to see she is in pain. The only place she can run is in her sleep, and even then, I don't know if she's being chased - so I can't help her there, either.

Greta is my first dog. There were times I said I didn't want her. Times I called her stupid...

Just words.
Just like these.
These won't do anything.
They're not even making me feel better.


This is Greta. We could give her people food. It didn't matter.

She liked bread. Cheese, I think was her favorite. American cheese... from Acme. But if you got it from somewhere, that was cool too. And Peanut butter... add that to any pill we had to give her, and it's gone. Any vegetables were out of the question, though. No one wants vegetables. She once ate a doubled batch of chocolate chip cookies... Pulled them right off the table... Just about 80 cookies, I think.

She is an awesome dog. I love her, I think she knows that.

I remember, when we could walk her around where I live, I'd share my water with her... If I had a lollipop, which I generally did, I'd let her have some. I didn't care. Greta is my dog. She belongs with my family. And everyone who knows her will miss her. Count on it.



There's never going to be another dog like her. She'll sit right in front of you, plop her head in your lap and just stare at you. I love her. I'll miss her.