Nessie,
I’ve had trouble really sitting down and trying to write this for weeks now. It’s been two weeks since you passed away, and yet I still haven’t felt any sort of closure within me.
I knew it was coming for years. You were 14 years old. You lived much longer than any of us thought you would. From the moment we picked you up from the kennel after my 16th birthday trip, we found out you had a collapsed trachea.
Then, the cough came, something we and you had to deal with for five years after that.
Even so, despite that, you still had so much life in you. You would still climb on top of my belly and lick my face to make me feel better after a really long day of pain. You would run up the stairs with your short stubby legs during a thunderstorm to find comfort from one of us, usually either me or my brother. You would run around and still try to chase the squirrels, although not as fast as you used to run.
And my favorite, you still sunbathed, laying out in the sun for hours, just falling asleep, something that I always envied from you as a dog: the lack of worries.
Nessie, I want you to know that your time here was the best time of my life. I can barely remember a time where I didn’t have a dog crying to go outside to use the bathroom, or staring up at me as I ate my chicken nuggets from McDonald’s. But even so, now it’s not going to be the same.
You won’t be there staring at me. You won’t be chasing squirrels. You won’t be barking at a flying leaf. Instead, you’ll be upstairs in doggy heaven, eating all the human food you want now.
You know, I never understood how you did survive so long. Of course we took care of you, made sure you were comfortable, but there were so many times where you should have passed away earlier – like when you literally ate half of my chocolate cake for my birthday, and somehow didn’t even have a stomach ache.
How you survived that, I still don’t know.
You gave me the best 14 years a pet could give. I know it’s almost selfish to want to ask for more years after how long you’ve lived, but I’m content with the time you’ve given me, and the memories I’ve received because of them. No matter what, no dog or cat I get in the future, is going to replace the little runt of the litter that was the quietest out of all the yappy west highland white terriers.
I still remember the first time I held you, how small you were. You were still small even now, if not with a little more blubber on you. But I knew from the moment I held you, it would be a friendship for a lifetime.
Sure, we’ve had our tough times in the past – I did accidentally fall on you when I tripped when I was seven; still sorry about that – but we’ve gotten passed that. Because there’s nothing more pure in this world than the unconditional love a dog has for it’s human.
And the love that I had for you was unconditional, too.
I know that you’re in a better place now. You’re resting and not coughing, and you’re running around just as fast as you did when you were a puppy. You’re eating all the chocolate cake in the world without a tummy ache, and living it up with the neighborhood puppers that have gone on to the doggy gates in the sky.
Nothing in this world could ever come close to the amazing dog you were throughout my childhood, how you stood by my side no matter what happened. Through my bullying in elementary and middle school, to friend and relationship drama in high school, to my own personal mental health in college, you were there for me. And I will always be grateful for that.
So for that, I want to say thank you for everything. For the puppy licks, and the sniffs, and the barks, and everything in-between. Thank you for giving me a childhood that I can proudly look back on and say I had one of the best dogs ever, and may you rest with all the bacon you want now.
I love you, forever. And please don’t pee on God’s carpet too.
With my whole heart,
Alex