Goodbye, Foxx
Our First Corgi, and Pack Leader, "Foxx" was never supposed to live very long...
Tho Corgi's normally have a short legged conformation, they are not dwarfs...big dogs with short legs, maybe...
Foxx, however, was in fact a dwarf...
She was a dwarf born to Champion parents, and the normal practice would have been for the Breeder to destroy the defective pup at birth, to keep the faulty genetics from being passed on.
Foxx's owner, however, who was waiting on a liver transplant at the time and very aware of her own mortality, could not bring herself to do it...the little dog had an engaging and powerful spirit even then.
A Champion in her own right...
Foxx was put up for adoption with a Corgi rescue group...and she did not have to wait long...
Precious Bride got wind of the availability of this special little dog and dashed up to Dallas to get her...a short trip of only 400 miles or so...and the rest, as they say, is history. I think she pulled the kids out of school...as good a reason to play "Hooky" as I can think of...
We were down to just one dog at the time...our dear old "Dotty"...
We had adopted "Dotty" and her litter-mate "Turtle" as pups from the local shelter...
They were a Jack Russel Terrier and Beagle mix...I christened them "Teagles"...they were sweet and happy...utterly devoted to the kids...and had the hardest heads of any dogs I have had the pleasure to know, before or since...
Thru a lot of hard work they developed excellent manners, and were loving and gentle even when the kids played rough, but if you wanted any tricks, you would have been better off hiring a Clown ...
In retrospect, maybe they were a lot smarter than I give them credit for...
Well, the kids were young, and we prized durability over intellect in our dogs at that time...
"Turtle" unfortunately had succumbed to heart-worms two years before, and Dotty sorely missed her...so sad and listless...I know you can't ascribe human emotions like "depression" to dogs but she was fading away like a picture left in the sun too long...
That changed when Foxx came into all our lives...
Foxx and Dotty were as close as peanut butter and jelly...the older dog came back to life...and the old girls joy doubled again when we rescued "Stella"...
Dotty was just destined to be a Pack Leader...she adored her younger charges and you never saw any of the dogs alone...always in a Pack...her old joy was back and stayed with her till the end of her days...
It was as if Dotty was training Foxx to be the next Pack Leader...
Foxx never let the physical problems caused by her dwarfism bother her...she was a little shorter than most Corgi's, which is saying a LOT, but the issue that caused the most problems was her spine...the genetic defect that caused her small stature left her spine shortened, compacted and stiff...subject to arthritis and spinal stenosis, or an abnormal narrowing of the spaces that holds the spinal cord and major nerves...
She looked sort of plump...but that was just a disguise...she had muscles like a weight-lifter and was as fast as lightning...more than few squirrels found out about her speed suddenly, and to their eternal regret...
Foxx loved to train her humans to play fetch...returning balls, sticks or a toy right to your hand for hours on end...her favorite way to greet you was to run and get "Porkie" (a little plastic hedgehog and her favorite and only worldly possession) and bark you out until you played with her...
Corgi's are an ancient breed...the smallest of the herding dogs, very rule-bound and routine driven...Foxx was an especially demanding little shitz...
She would let you know if anything in her world had changed...down to the arrangement of the couch cushions and stuff on the kitchen counters...kept a close account of where her humans were at all times...and raised all kinds of h#ll if anything was out of place...
You change anything in a Corgi's world at your peril, for, to paraphrase Shakespeare, it would then be a case of "...cry Havoc! ...and let slip the dogs of Law..."
Foxx made a perfect Pack Leader...GAWD help you if your broke the rules...a regular curmudgeon...
Foxx had been slowing down considerably in the week before I made my trip to TOGR...stiffer than usual...she needed more and more anti-inflammatory medication for her arthritis...and I would cut our games short to keep her from overdoing it...
I had no idea what was REALLY going on...
After almost 10 years, Foxx's spine just couldn't take any more...and the vertebrae in her neck were crumbling...my Daughter had taken Foxx to the Vet...but all he could offer was pain relief, as there was no stopping it.
By the time I was ready to leave for home, Foxx was paralysed from the neck down.
I dug her grave right next to Dottie's and headed South...
The Girls had made all the arrangements...so we spent one last night with our dear Friend, and took her to the Vet the next morning...
Even the Vet was crying as we ended Foxx's pain...but Death came for Foxx as a friend, and she passed away gently in the arms of a family that loved her...
After all these years, I have seen many souls off on their last journey...but I will not soon forget watching the light flicker and finally go out in those beautiful golden eyes as I cradled her head ... Her pain and fear was over ...
We parted company with the Daughter, and Precious Bride and I took Foxx on up to TOGR...
We took the back roads...and it rained most of the way, a perfect counterpoint to our mood...
It was a slow, grim trip...
But as if to provide us some small measure of comfort, the rain stopped just before we got to TOGR and, most importantly, had missed Foxx's grave entirely, so we buried her, wrapped in her favorite blanket and with her beloved "Porkie", next to Dottie.
While clearing the brush away to open a grave for Foxx, I had found three hardwood trees had popped up in the gaps left where all the oaks and pines died out recently...
I'll have to tend those trees...Maybe Dottie and Foxx will get a little shade, and some birds, squirrels and deer to harass...
Precious Bride and I stopped off at her Parents for a cup of coffee and some fellowship...and headed back South...heavy hearts or not, life goes on and we have much to do...
We got an enthusiastic greeting from Stella, Bob and Zoey...but they all wondered why Foxx was not with us and spent much time looking for her...
Stella, now the Pack Leader, spent the first of many nights in Foxx's bed...getting up often to search the house for her Friend.
...it will be a long time before any of us stops looking for her...
T
