know it has been four years and you have seen a thousand animals in the mean time but I couldn’t help but write to tell you that yesterday we lost Tucker the blind German shepherd we adopted from you in 2011. He was as close to being the perfect dog as any dog could have been. He never let being blind stop him from doing anything. We traveled to the interior many times where he would sit patiently in the golf cart as I slashed my way around the golf course. I swear I could hear him whisper “Thank God I’m blind buddy because your game sounds like it sucks.” He loved the heat of Osoyoos on our yearly trips there as well. But perhaps he was at his best on our trips to Tofino. There he would run along the shore lines at full tilt barking and bighting at the waves. Not bad when the waves were chest high but in Tofino some of the waves were twice his height. But that never stopped him. He’d be wept off his feet and come back spitting out seawater and seaweed and start chasing the waves again. After a few minutes of this everyone on the beach would come down to watch this ‘crazy’ dog and ask what he was doing. I’d ask if they saw the Tsunami warning sign posted in the area. Then I would say he was protecting the western world from those killer waves. “You’ve notice in the three days that we have been here not one wave got off the beach.” His first year he bowled over a young boy who was dipping his bucket in the water. Before I could apologize to his mother she yelled at me “Is your dog f----g blind?” Now remember Tucker had his eyes removed. I looked at her then at Tucker and said “By the way he is.” She shrunk like a rose in a rain storm and never said a word. He was diagnosed with TCC last December and thanks to the wonderful care of Dr Janice Crook at the Mosquito Animal Clinic and Dr Sarah Charney at Boundary Bay he was happy and active right up to the last hours. I am not sure if I can ever adopt again after Tucker but I will never stop telling all who will listen that just because a dog is labeled as special needs and or a senior don’t overlook them. They can give just as much love as any puppy with all the working parts. Maybe more.
rest in peace tucker, so lucky to be so well loved.
awww i remember tucker too and i remember u taking him. that was a happy day im glad he spent his final years with you.