R.I.P

Beck

April 20, 1999 - February 24, 2006

Beck died this afternoon. We had construction workers over at the house today doing our six month walk through. While they were fixing various things, I had the dogs in the garage so they would be out of the way. A few times in between workers, I let them back in. Well, I went to let them in after the carpenter left & only Buddha came in. Beck was laying on the floor, not moving, not breathing. He got into the dog food & had another seizure. I'm not sure if it was the seizure that took him or choking on the food during the seizure. But, he's no longer with us.

I called Bill & told him to come home. Beck was dead. I tried to stay as calm as I could, as I was still holding Logan & I didn't want to make him cry too. Plus we still had people working on different things in the house. It seemed to take forever for Bill to get home. I saw him pull into the driveway & went to meet him outside. "He's definitely dead", I cried. Bill hugged me & we walked in the house. He opened the garage door & it broke his heart. I don't think I've seen him so hurt before. Beck is the first dog that he has ever lost. Our dogs were like kids to us before we had Logan. We cried together for a while.

Bill dug a hole in the back yard & we wrapped him up in a sheet with his leash & harness. That action really made me upset. We were both sobbing as he put him into the ground. We said a few words of remembrance & laid him to rest. He has a large stone for a marker & I think I'll plant something there this spring. Even though he was a quiet dog, the house seems very still. Too still.

We first saw our little beagle while we were living in Vegas. It was independence day weekend & we decided that Buddha needed a brother because we were gone for so long during the day. We stopped by a pet shop that was close to our home. When I saw him I wanted him right away. We asked if we could let him out of his cage. He proceeded to run around the place causing all sorts of havoc. There was a pen of poodles in the middle of the store & Beck would try to pull them out through the small chain links by their fur. It was pretty funny. We knew that we were going to take this little hell raiser home.

It took a little while for Beck & Buddha to get used to each other, but when they clicked, they were brothers for life. They were like peanut butter & jelly, never going anywhere without the other. They would cuddle & run around & embarrassed us with "dog shows" when we had company over. He was a cute puppy too. He had big paws & floppy ears that he would chew on. He tried to get out of the kitchen (where we put up a baby gate too keep them in) almost every night. We kept him busy with a dog puzzle. It was a cube that we would put a treat in & he would roll it around the house trying to get the treat out. He was pretty smart with that toy. We lovingly called him "Speckabeck".


We moved to Portland & rented a house with a yard. We knew that Beck would love it seeing as though we were coming from a small apartment. We soon discovered that Beck was a little escape artist. One day at work, Bill got a call from some guy telling him that he had Beck. Beck was walking onto the free way & this guy rescued him (also feeding him pizza). It took a couple of escapes & rescues by our neighbors for us to keep him chained up. He really didn't mind that at all, as long as he could still be outside.


We moved to Colorado & we were excited that we had our very own back yard to build them a dog house. We were planning on doing that this spring when we do the landscaping. Even though our yard wasn't completely fenced in, we still let the dogs out. There were times that it was a bitter 12 degrees out, but Beck would still be out there sniffing around with his beagle nose. We could count on him coming back, because we had food & treats.

We saw a gradual increase in his seizures, but there was nothing that could be done about them. Medications didn't work that well & they had side effects that seemed worse than just the seizures. We knew that he would probably pass from this disease, but not so soon. He was a good & happy dog. Even though I had lost my patience with him during my pregnancy. He wasn't as bad as I made him out to be.

As Bill cried this afternoon at the open grave, "Good bye little buddy".