We lay in the quiet, cranky with one another after a long day in a long summer during a long season…and I know he is saying it to be kind and to let me know he’s on my side when he tells me low, I had Mike dig Woodrow’s grave while he had the backhoe here.

As happens every autumn in Alaska, some winter-prep chores fall to the bottom of the long list and in the frenzy to button up, uncompleted ones get forgotten once snow comes.

Move it to the spring list, we’ll get it at Breakup.

Except this one was important. When I’d asked him last fall to take our boys out before snowfall and dig a spot for my big white dog to rest –right there in front of that little copse of trees at the edge of the barnyard; he’s watched over it all these years, that’s where I want him…

I was mad when it didn’t make it to the completed chores before the ground froze up.

He assured me it would be okay. This just means he’s going to see it through another winter, babe.

And then around February -five months into our old boy’s 4-6 month prognosis- I noticed a bit of a slow-down, a slight decline.

I turned my dread to anger and aimed it toward my husband, sure my dog was going to die and that we were in the beginning of his last days.

It will be okay. I’ve already decided what we’ll do if we have to put him down. I’ll have him cremated for you.

I fumed.

YOU don’t get to make that decision. He’s MY dog. I asked you to do it last fall and you didn’t…it’s not your decision to make.

And Woodrow and I went out on the porch and I had a cigar and cried while I stroked his big white head that he loves to rest along my hip.

He’s not really just MY dog. He is so loved by so many. And he loves so many, too. But me and him, we’re like peas and carrots and I’m not a furbaby kind of dog owner, but the kids tease anyway and say Woodrow is Mom’s favorite child.

I decided that day that my husband would purchase a freezer large enough for our dog and we would lay him to rest in the spring. That may sound morbid, twisted even; but understand, we live in a place where burial is not an option for half of each year. Folks on farms do what we have to do. And while I wholeheartedly embrace cremation for animals (and people!), I have decided it’s not what I want for Woodrow.

Any other dog and I would be fine with cremation. Any other dog I would be at peace laying them to rest next to Annie and Daisy, our Char and sweet Beau…but somehow Woodrow is different and I want him close to the land he has so loved every day since he learned it was his. His disorientation to his new geography and his thousands of years of instinct took him on a ten-mile perimeter check his first week on our farm before I learned how to teach him that he is only responsible for us.

Right here.

And in the five years since, he’s never once left again.

So in my heart, he deserves to lie next to the barnyard.

He has earned his rest under the trees.

But then his sweet angel doctor from the north of us taught me how to make adjustments to his medications -those wonder drugs that keep his big actual heart pumping in rhythm with the big guardian heart he has for his people and his farm, and he perked back up and started jumping up on the porch again.

It’s been one extra year we’ve had with Woodrow now.

One year since the day I drove back to fetch him after x-rays, my tears streaming as I processed the news that the best thing I could do for him that day would be to have him euthanized.

One year since I my heart fell into my gut, knowing I’d never again have another dog that would ever come close to holding my heart like this one does.

I’ve loved some good dogs that were best friends to me. Some damn good dogs.

This dog is different and it feels more like the relationship us animal folks have with horses -that keen sense of not having to talk but learning to trust one another; that understanding that comes from just the slightest shift of movement, or just a look into one another’s eyes, a sound or a sigh…a telepathy almost and he looks to me for it, and he is smart like I’ve never known a dog to be, and I never knew the high value of a livestock guardian dog until him; nor did I know their intelligence or intuition. Their sweetness in spite of their always being a little guarded. And their deep and undying loyalty. People with dogs feel what I’m saying. People with livestock guardian dogs they’re bonded to KNOW what I’m saying.

I brought him home and I did what I do, I researched and I sought answers and I fielded the advice and I prayed.

And it’s been eleven months since his angel doctor with the high tech equipment was able to narrow down his exact problem and rein it in with a medication regime he remains on to this day.

My friend furiously canned up Woodrow meals, we found our routine with his feed and his meds, and we all know now the red pill is only at bedtime and the rest are twice a day.

Matthew shops the sales for meat, and he gets mad at me when I feed Woodrow a pork roast with the brown rice when I didn’t know my husband was looking forward to pork chops.

He turns his nose up at the blueberries or carrots I add, but happily scarfs up his dish when I add a little chicken broth.

He’d dropped so much weight when he was first sick, my kids now call him chubby since he’s hit 130 pounds. I don’t feel it in his ribs or his belly, but I’m watching him because that’s what I do.

And don’t you know, I got a notice from his big-city vet’s office this week that it’s time for his one-year check-in. They’ve been angels, truly, calling in his prescriptions monthly, working with our local vet for the occasional bloodwork to make sure his medications aren’t tearing up his kidneys…but now it’s time to go see them again. Actually go see them.

I sat in their office nearly a year ago and we cried together and we worked our plan, and both the vet and I knew that we’d probably never see one another face to face again. Why would we? He had four to six months to live, and we’ve got our vets down here on this side of the mountains.

But now it’s time to go see them again.

I don’t know why I’ve been given an extra year with Woodrow, but it isn’t lost on me what a blessing it is.

We’ve had good friends lose good dogs this past year. We’ve lost one of our own. We have friends right now, the people kind and the furry kind, that are in the thick of the fight, daily medications, comfort plans, trips to the CBD store to knock back some of the pain in cancer-riddled canine bones, trips out from the vet to euthanize peacefully on cozy and worn dog-beds…

They get old. They get sick. We have to say goodbye to them so soon. Too soon.

Every single time, it’s never enough time.

None of us really said it out loud, but we knew that this summer will most likely be Woodrow’s last.

So when a top-notch puppy from a top-notch breeder popped up coincidentally, the farmers in our farm family had a conversation.

I didn’t want another dog. I wanted to let Woodrow take part of my heart with him and then maybe someday…long into the future, I might be ready for a little wee baby dog to sit on my dash and curl up behind my knees at night.

But my daughter has too many sheep to not have a guardian, and Woodrow can’t go on forever, as much as we’d all love it if he could.

And like most things we don’t say out loud, we all knew a new puppy was going to be Woodrow’s replacement.

So another little gift from Heaven made his way to us.

These servants of the LORD as my dear friend once said.

This little puppy my daughter and I share, his lazy little personality that matches our big Woodrow’s to a tee…his spunkiness and sweetness a freshness in the house and on the farm…I promise Woodrow every time I see him playing with the puppy that I won’t tell anyone.

He growls at him, he leads him around, he protects him from the marauding geese, he scowls, he lifts his lip, he sniffs him when he sleeps…he watches over him, and in doing so, he teaches him.

These dogs…all dogs…they are servants of the LORD.

Angels here, blessings to make life a little less cold…to bring a little more comfort.

Companionship.

Friendship.

Protection.

Warmth.

They serve a purpose. Every last one of them.

And sometimes, every once in a while in this life…we’re granted a little extra time.

Sometimes it wasn’t our time to say goodbye.

And oh, doesn’t that change things?

Doesn’t that give the heart a little hope? A little reprieve from the heaviness of having to say goodbye today?

The day will come. It always does.

And every single time, they take a piece of us when they go.

But we’ve been given an extra year with Woodrow.

And now, as we smell the snow in the air and see it settling on the mountaintops, my husband telling me there is a grave dug now is a way for him to bring a little peace to my heart.

A way for him to tell me that he loves me, and that he loves my dog too. That he knows what this dog means to me, what dogs mean to all of us.

And that we honor them when we do right by them all the way up until the end, and even after.

What are the odds we’ll have him yet one more winter?

They are slim, but now I know I have a place for him to rest.

He has been a servant of the LORD, and that is what I hear when my husband tells me he has fulfilled my wishes for my big white angel.

That our dog is deserving of the best I can give him.

So in the meantime, we’ll do what we should all strive to do every single day that we are here.

We’ll give all the love we have…

for all the time we’re given.

“All his life he tried to be a good person. Many times, however, he failed. For after all, he was only human. He wasn’t a dog.” -Charles M. Schulz