Bill
A donation was made in memory of Bill by the doctors and staff at Green Lake Animal Hospital on Sep 17, 2018.
Bill, our friend and constant companion, died peacefully on August 31, 2018. It was much harder for us than for him to say goodbye; he was 16 and not given to sentimentality. Because I am, I want to share some of Bill’s extraordinary life.
We met him 14 years ago at the Skagit Valley Animal Shelter. We were led there by Pet Finder’s promise of a yellow lab. As we walked along the clean, big kennels and were greeted by one friendly, well-behaved Rotwieler/lab mix after another. If we had any sense, we would have adopted one of the eager to please pups. But then we saw this gigantic, bright-white dog jammed into the back corner of his kennel, shaking. We opened the kennel, went in and sat down, hoping he’d come over eventually. In a preview of things to come, he did not oblige. It took a handful of Pop Tarts to lure him forward and then out of the kennel. The staff at the shelter told us that they had picked him up on the side of Highway 530 and that it had taken a team of them to subdue him. They named him “Desperado.” Once we learned that, we knew we needed to adopt him if for no other reason than to get him a decent name. But the staff there told us that we should wait a week to be sure no one claimed him, and then we needed to find a good trainer to help us.
We did both. Sally and Jennie Goode came back the next weekend. He was still mostly frozen so they picked him up and carried him to the car. He whimpered and shook the whole way home, convincing Sally and Jennie that he was not a flight risk. But when they arrived home and opened the hatch, he squirted out like a bar of soap. And he was fast. Like Greyhound fast. Ferrari fast. They eventually captured him but it wouldn’t be the last time Bill erupted out of the gate and tore through the neighborhood in a freedom-induced panic.
We discovered quickly that he had never been indoors before. He was frightened of doorways, approaching them in a crouch and then scooting through. Also, the refrigerator was a threat. And the space between the fridge and the stove. One morning, a couple of days after he first arrived, I came down stairs to find Bill standing – all four paws – on the dining room table looking out the windows. He looked over at me, standing stunned on the stairs, and I could just hear him saying, “Oh, hi Liz. Isn’t this cool?”
And then there was the leash. He would drop to the floor and freeze whenever he saw one. It was no small thing for him to learn to walk with one, but given the olympic caliber sprinting, it needed to happen. He learned to walk on a leash, to sit, to lie down, to wait, to leave it. But never to come. He learned to love the house, especially the bed and the couch. He guarded his perimeter, his people and his cats, protecting them furiously from school buses, motorcycles, UPS trucks (not Fed Ex), and – horrifyingly – people who limp. He quickly developed a rep the in the neighborhood, some people crossing to the other side of the street when they saw him. The truth is, he was scared and not so great at distinguishing a real threat from, say, a school bus.
He mellowed with age, becoming more judicious with the barking and lunging and more generous with his affection. He loved all cats and all small dogs, his own cats especially. He loved all boys and all construction guys. He loved Gretchen. And oh how he loved Jennie. He adored our neighbor Craig. And he loved the people at Metro Dog, the only people in the world (including us) he would let give him a bath. We will miss him everyday. He taught us so much about resilience and the fierceness of love. We are so grateful to the professionals at Greenlake Animal Hospital caring for him through his life and especially for making the last few weeks as comfortable as possible for him and for us.
We met him 14 years ago at the Skagit Valley Animal Shelter. We were led there by Pet Finder’s promise of a yellow lab. As we walked along the clean, big kennels and were greeted by one friendly, well-behaved Rotwieler/lab mix after another. If we had any sense, we would have adopted one of the eager to please pups. But then we saw this gigantic, bright-white dog jammed into the back corner of his kennel, shaking. We opened the kennel, went in and sat down, hoping he’d come over eventually. In a preview of things to come, he did not oblige. It took a handful of Pop Tarts to lure him forward and then out of the kennel. The staff at the shelter told us that they had picked him up on the side of Highway 530 and that it had taken a team of them to subdue him. They named him “Desperado.” Once we learned that, we knew we needed to adopt him if for no other reason than to get him a decent name. But the staff there told us that we should wait a week to be sure no one claimed him, and then we needed to find a good trainer to help us.
We did both. Sally and Jennie Goode came back the next weekend. He was still mostly frozen so they picked him up and carried him to the car. He whimpered and shook the whole way home, convincing Sally and Jennie that he was not a flight risk. But when they arrived home and opened the hatch, he squirted out like a bar of soap. And he was fast. Like Greyhound fast. Ferrari fast. They eventually captured him but it wouldn’t be the last time Bill erupted out of the gate and tore through the neighborhood in a freedom-induced panic.
We discovered quickly that he had never been indoors before. He was frightened of doorways, approaching them in a crouch and then scooting through. Also, the refrigerator was a threat. And the space between the fridge and the stove. One morning, a couple of days after he first arrived, I came down stairs to find Bill standing – all four paws – on the dining room table looking out the windows. He looked over at me, standing stunned on the stairs, and I could just hear him saying, “Oh, hi Liz. Isn’t this cool?”
And then there was the leash. He would drop to the floor and freeze whenever he saw one. It was no small thing for him to learn to walk with one, but given the olympic caliber sprinting, it needed to happen. He learned to walk on a leash, to sit, to lie down, to wait, to leave it. But never to come. He learned to love the house, especially the bed and the couch. He guarded his perimeter, his people and his cats, protecting them furiously from school buses, motorcycles, UPS trucks (not Fed Ex), and – horrifyingly – people who limp. He quickly developed a rep the in the neighborhood, some people crossing to the other side of the street when they saw him. The truth is, he was scared and not so great at distinguishing a real threat from, say, a school bus.
He mellowed with age, becoming more judicious with the barking and lunging and more generous with his affection. He loved all cats and all small dogs, his own cats especially. He loved all boys and all construction guys. He loved Gretchen. And oh how he loved Jennie. He adored our neighbor Craig. And he loved the people at Metro Dog, the only people in the world (including us) he would let give him a bath. We will miss him everyday. He taught us so much about resilience and the fierceness of love. We are so grateful to the professionals at Greenlake Animal Hospital caring for him through his life and especially for making the last few weeks as comfortable as possible for him and for us.
