Turtles, Truths, and Prunes: Bob's Bookends

In October of 2012, Bob the labradoodle came to live with me. At that time, I was deciding whether to add him to my brood or help find him another home. Within minutes, there was no question. Bob was mine and he wiggled into my heart forever. His presence brought me a kind of joy I didn't know was even missing from my life.

His first family was going through an amicable separation and divorce. Alan was a working dad and Jena was a stay-at-home mom, and new challenges transpired with her returning to school and him assuming more parenting duties on his weeks with the kids. At a year and a half old, Bob would add to their challenges exponentially, and no one was sure who should take him. Their black lab Alli was mature enough to go with the flow and either accompany the kids with each weekly transition or stay with Jena. My offer to try on Bob was accepted because they knew I loved dogs and as a friend of the family, he could still be in their kids’ lives.

When Bob died on Friday, the frantic search for old pictures and records began. Jena went through her old Facebook posts and couldn’t find record of it. She admitted that she probably didn’t say anything to many because she didn’t want people giving her a hard time about adding something else—an unruly puppy—to her already chaotic life. Although she and Alan decided together to add him to their family, Bob was her idea. She was always searching for a something to fill voids she couldn’t quite explain.

In mid August of 2011, Jena loaded a puppy crate into her kid-van in Pocatello and headed to Jerome by herself to get Bob. The three kids were 3, 6, and 11 at the time and Alli the black dog was 6. (They’d gotten Alli within two weeks of having their second child.) Her drive presented precious alone time that was scarce in her life. She talks of how Bob picked her out. All the other puppies galloped and played and paid her no attention, but Bob came to her. He approached her.

She sang to him on the way home because he whined for his litter mates. He threw up in his crate, so she pulled over to clean it up. She used her Eddie Bauer pocket knife out of the glove box to cut an old quilt kept in the back of the van for picnics. She cleaned up his mess with half of the quilt and put the other half in the crate with him for comfort.

Alan and Jena named all of their animals after musicians. Alli was named after Alison Kraus and Bob was named after Robert Smith of The Cure.

Bob spent a lot of his puppyhood in a crate. The family would let him out to be among them and he was terrible. Stay-at-home moms with more than one kid can easily imagine the chaotic after-dinner scene with kids sparring and no one helping clean up and there’s whining about baths and bickering over toys and Dad has to go downstairs to finish up some work and the black lab is getting into the trash and the other dog, BOB, is on the counter—ON THE COUNTER eating the entire loaf of bread set for the kids’ lunches the next day. Things like that happened often, so Bob was relegated to the crate.

One time he ate the oldest’s beta fish and then peed on her bed—likely right before bedtime when there wasn’t time to wash sheets. He chewed cables in the back yard and ate kids’ sack lunches. He’d steal underwear and eat them and then puke them up on the carpet within inches from the easy-to-clean tile. They loved him, but he was A LOT. He needed time and attention and exercise, but so did everyone else in the family. They weren’t equipped to handle him while they were together, and it was going to be more difficult with them apart.

When he came to live with me, I had to introduce him to my 11 year old golden very carefully. She and her sister who’s 12 stay with me half the time and with my ex the other half, and they are so sweet to people, but terribly aggressive. During their first meeting, my golden lunged at Bob, and I stuck my leg in between them. I suffered a terrible dog bite square in my thigh. All of Quincy’s teeth punctured my skin and I couldn’t run or ride my bike for a week.

The dogs worked it out and Stacy and Quincy let Bob into their pack.

Bob would spend time playing with the goldens and playing with Alli, but the goldens and Alli never play together. He was the diplomat.

He loved to hike and bike and be moving. It helped him to behave. Barely. He’d run the trails and City Creek with so much zeal that he’d knock down the kids if he didn’t see them around the corner. When he’d visit Jena’s house, he’d resort to his worst behaviors with the trash and food thievery. Kids and adults would scold and yell and lock angry stares with his guilty eyes while he’d slink away and scheme some more.

On the Friday he died, I had just let Bob and Alli out of the kennel for their lunchtime let-out. They were zooming around the yard—bounding and lurching and chasing like they always did. I went inside to make lunch when I heard Bob’s cry. I could see out the window that it was his neck. They probably collided in a perfect catastrophe. Bob’s neck was broken, and he was likely paralyzed instantly.

I called Jena. She was in class. I got Bob into the truck and picked Jena up on the way to the vet. She got in the passenger seat but after a block, she wanted to get in the back with him. He was fading. She tried breathing for him remembering mouth-to-snout tips she’d read, but it was useless. I could hear her crying in the back of the truck as I sped and when I stopped at the vet and opened the tail gate, she was sobbing over his lifeless body. Oh Bob. Oh Jena. He was with you when he came home and he was with you when he left.

The vet staff brought out a cart and got him in and they checked his vitals and he had indeed passed. The poor vet is new to their office. She was so kind and so tender and left us to be with Bob. We cried and pet him and took a few pictures. I texted Alan while standing over Bob. Alan is a no-nonsense, no-frills guy, so my text was succinct and to the point:

So Bob and Alli were wrestling in the yard. Bob broke his neck. He’s gone. Will you please let the kids know?

He responded with:

I’m so sorry. That is awful. You ok?

As condolences poured in via Facebook, I felt like I wanted to be around people. Alan called the brew pub to reserve space for a gathering that night because neither Jena nor I could imagine carrying on a conversation yet. He said he’d come by and bring the kids. He also brought an iPad so we could run a mini slide show of Bob pictures.

While people were toasting Bob and buying me beers because they felt the joy and mischievousness of his spirit in my Facebook posts, Jena, Alan and the kids were there mourning, too. Bob’s death brought back memories of how he came to be Bob at a time when their lives and their family was very different than it is now.

As over 200 comments of comfort and support for me came in after Bob died, Jena was experiencing more than I can imagine. She’s got her own loss in his departure, being with him at his beginning and his end. She’s got a guilt that she couldn’t be to him what I was; she wasn’t the one who told her boys he died; and that night at the brew pub, she watched the woman who Alan is now dating offer wonderful comfort and sweet solace to her sons. That is a lot of damn stuff to process in the passing of Bob.

Life is a constant series of taking hold and letting go. Deciding what we can handle and what we can’t. When to love and when to retreat. Making mistakes and making amends. Elements of Bob’s life had many people making these choices through pain and joy and hope and just doing the best they could.

As humans, I truly believe that we do the best with what we have. And what we don’t have. Right now I am sad—SO SAD! —that I no longer have Bob, but I’ll just keep doing the best I can. Bob became my dog and our bond was recognizable and indisputable, but his first family still loved and maintained their own bond. Bob was my souldog, but Jena was his bookends.

Jena and Bob "helping" me pack.

My favorite collage capturing his expressions.

Bob was their protector and their pal.

And even though he ate her fish, peed on her bed
and always went through her trash, the oldest
still loved him and took this picture on his last birthday.