Sadly, I’ve said goodbye to my dog friend Boo, who moved with her owners to Durham. I already miss her peachy-colored, spotted face. My parting present to her was a bag of teddy-bear-shaped dog biscuits.

“This woman has spoiled more dogs,” I can just hear someone saying. A pet store owner in Falmouth loudly proclaimed this years ago when I was purchasing yet another treat for a friend’s dog.

My mother liked cats, and my father disliked dogs because of an early childhood scare, so I don’t know how I grew to be so fond of dogs.

“Why don’t you get a dog?” everyone always asks me. I don’t want the responsibility. Furthermore, recently I was diagnosed with allergies to both cats and dogs. “Don’t go out and get a kitten,” the allergist said to me at Christmastime. I guess that would apply to a Great Dane as well.

Change has never been easy for me. As I like my neighbors and friends, so do I like their dogs. But life changes. Children grow up, people move and their dogs grow old and then they are no longer there to greet me.

A couple I’d known in college was the first of my friends to get a dog. Ajax, a big husky, lived a long life, long enough for me to see him in both their homes.

Max was the first Dalmatian my friends on Mount Desert Island owned, later followed by Zeda. He, too, lived a long life. I was known as his Aunt Vicki.

As I’ve aged, now I am Grammie Vicki to my friends’ dogs. And, like a grandmother, I can love them without the full-time care.

Buddy was my friend Lisa’s black Lab. He had health issues in his declining years, but kept on going with Lisa’s help. She also adopted two elderly rescues. Those dogs have all died and she has moved away, but now has rescued two Chihuahuas.

One of the most memorable dogs was Chewie. He was a Lhasa apso who belonged to a previous supervisor and his wife. As my friend and his wife are welcoming, so was their dog. The final time I saw Chewie, who was old by then, I was standing in their living room, getting ready to leave. Chewie ran off and came back, dropping his favorite toy at my feet. I am still touched by his parting gesture.

There were also Tootsie and Goliath, Ben and Alfie, along with Bruno. So many dogs with such good lives who left an impression on me and big holes in their owners’ lives.

Soon I will be the one moving away to a more permanent residence, leaving other dog friends behind, and hopefully meeting new ones. I will continue to buy dog treats and be Grammie Vicki. Pepper will miss me. But Jojo’s owners, my new neighbors downstairs, have promised me they will bring him to visit me in my new place, hopefully making this transition a little easier for me.

 

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