I haven’t written a blog post in a while, but our family is grieving tonight. Writing about it seemed called for.

For years, when the girls were young, I resisted the idea of getting a dog for the family. Adena always joked that they would look at me one day with those sweet, beautiful, blue eyes and I would give in. I knew she was probably right. This dad is a big softie, especially for these girls (who I now call my ladies, since they aren’t young anymore).

I had a quick response, slightly in jest, but carrying a ring of truth as well:

“I don’t want to spend money to feed something that will never spend money to feed itself.”

At that point, I was focused on the economics. A dog meant more grocery budget, but I didn’t anticipate the half of it. When I relented almost ten years ago, we brought home a sweet beagle who was a few years old. And it wasn’t just the grocery budget. It was toys and beds and veterinary bills and later it was medicine and bigger veterinary bills. We paid for dog sitters and kennel stays when we went out of town. And the economics of this added up! I wasn’t wrong to resist this idea, if my only motivation was financial.

Don’t give up on me yet; you can probably hear the “but” coming. But…

But Adena was right about me. My love for those girls meant I would override my financial preferences. And I did, one Christmas. I surprised them with a package of dog items, wrapped under the tree. In January, we went out to a local rescue to check out some dogs. Millie, that sweet beagle I referenced above, let us know she wanted to go home with us. So home she came!

You won’t be surprised to learn that our experience with Millie wasn’t just the financial one I was afraid of.

We started walking around our neighborhood, which I hadn’t done much before. We had lived in the house for nearly ten years at that point, but I didn’t know many people beyond the ones who lived immediately around us. Millie became a source of community and conversation. We met and built relationships with neighbors on the other side of the block. These were people we might never have known.

I wrote about another insight I gained from those walks previously here on the blog. From her earliest days in our world, Millie challenged me to slow down and think differently.

God used Millie to help me reflect on my own patterns. I needed that lesson.

The girls also learned about new responsibility from Millie. They took turns feeding and providing water. Later, they started helping with the walks from time to time. They didn’t always handle this well, but they grew through this experience.

As Millie aged, there were new responsibilities and new challenges. She couldn’t manage herself well when we were away so we started using a crate whenever we were gone. Because she had frequent needs at night, Adena didn’t sleep very well for several of the last few years. Honestly, between you and me, it became frustrating and often extremely inconvenient. But I had read Proverbs too many times to miss this verse:

“The righteous care for the needs of their animals, but the kindest acts of the wicked are cruel.”

So I knew we would do what we needed to do. Even if just out of obedience.

The last couple of weeks, Millie started declining rapidly. The vet told us we were close to the end. She had been telling us for a while that “every day you have left with Millie is a gift”, so we were preparing ourselves. Millie stopped eating and drinking on her own. My sweet 14 year old took to giving her water through a syringe the last day or so. As all of this was happening, I started reflecting on that verse even more.

We sat on the floor with Millie last night as a family. I prayed for her to have peace as we said our goodbyes. We laid her in bed knowing that this would likely be the last night. And a little before 3 am, Adena woke me gently with the words, “she’s gone”.

Sorry if I brought you to the point of tears, but I’m there too.

As I laid in the bed, and held my grieving wife, I thought about how much love we developed for this sweet dog. The girls will cry in the morning because Millie became part of our family. There’s a lot to grieve in our world right now as we see friends and close family losing loved humans. Some would say a pet is the same love and the same loss, but as I reflect on this verse, I see it differently.

I think God called attention to the righteous character necessary to care for an animal, because an animal will never be able to tell on you. The evidence of animal negligence and downright cruelty is all around us, because it’s fairly easy to be selfish and not care. I’m ashamed to say it was selfishness that motivated me to not want a dog in the first place.

How well do I show love and care to those who may never return it?

Though she never fed herself, Millie did bring more love and care into our family. She helped us practice living unselfishly and practice made us better at it. We learned a lot from what Millie added to our lives; we will miss her.