The heart-wrenching decision was made on Saturday morning
after conferring with my ex. As some of you may remember from social media
posts a few months back, Sydney’s health had been steadily slipping. In
addition to a sudden onset of complete vision loss, the veterinarian discovered
a tumor of unknown origin and severity near her rectum. That tumor continued to
grow and started to bleed with increasing regularity in recent days. Her
overall skin integrity started to decline as well, with small growths and
scabby areas appearing in spots where hair had fallen out. Vinny and I discussed that her quality of
life was starting to slip now, with no discernible reaction to being outdoors
(which was always certain to set her tail wagging) and increased difficulty
navigating around his house in her darkened world. A slip down the stairs, a
fall off the bed, aimless wandering and bumping into things…not good signs. Although
she remained responsive to touch right up until the end, it appeared to us that
her overall awareness of her surroundings was gradually diminishing.
So when Sydney came into my life, I made her a promise on
the very first day we met that I’d always be there for her. I still remember
the late April day in 2000 when my dear friends Lisa and Brianne, together with
our late friend Jeffrey, all conspired to visit a local pet store (before it
was not politically correct to patronize them) called Puppy Deport in Port
Jefferson while Vinny was at work, unaware of what we were up to. We had talked
intermittently about getting a dog and were eyeing the Cocker Spaniel as the
chosen breed. But I had a long history of “surprising” Vinny with furry
companions – beginning the month after we met when he was greeted with two
little fur balls who would come to be named Branigan and Bam Bam, both stray
kittens found underneath my stepmother’s garage.
“Happy Father’s Day”, I remember announcing on the day they were
presented to him.
Two more kittens would come into our lives during those
first years together. The first, a gray and white kitten who we dubbed Chapman,
was found clinging to a tree by a former roommate and moved into the two
bedroom apartment (our first after moving out to Long Island) we shared with
her and our two cats. When she split, Chapman stayed behind. A few years later,
while Vinny was home painting the interior of the townhouse we had moved into
(Yaphank, 1993), a simple trip to the grocery store resulted in Moyet, a fiery
little ball of mischief who I gingerly placed on the kitchen counter before
calling Vinny downstairs.
“Don’t be mad”, I said as he rounded the corner into the
kitchen and caught sight of the latest member to our growing family.
But Vinny was never mad, always melting immediately after the
requisite eye roll, as if to say: You did
it again, didn’t you?
So on that late April day, as my friends and I meandered
through the Puppy Depot, I knew two things in my heart: I was going to find my
second dog that afternoon and Vinny would not be mad. Not really. Or at least
not for long.
I told the pet store staff that I was in the market for a
Cocker Spaniel and they readily presented me with several squirming, licking,
panting specimens for my consideration. Let’s face it: All puppies are pretty
damn cute and irresistible, and I probably would have been happy with any one
of them. But something kept telling me “No,
that’s not the one” with each successive puppy I held and so I kept on
wandering deeper into the Puppy Depot.
About thirty minutes in, I passed a cage with three puppies.
Two – I couldn’t tell you the breeds this many years later – were pressed
against the front of the cage, vying for my attention with whimpers and wagging
tails. But it was the third – a doe-eyed little Cocker Spaniel with
champagne-colored fur and matching freckles on her white nose – that caught my
attention.
“That’s a Cocker, isn’t it?” I asked the attentive pet store
clerk, pointing to the cage.
The clerk nodded. “Yes, but you don’t want that one. See the
freckles on the nose? You’ll never be able to show her.”
Show her? I
thought to myself. Did I look like I was
shopping for the next entrant into the Westminster Dog Show?
With gentle defiance, I instructed the clerk to let me see
her.
And when the pet store clerk shrugged and placed that
freckled-nosed pup in my arms, it was – as the cliché goes – love at first
sight. We locked eyes – hers always sorrowful and sweet, mine quickly welling
with tears – and then she rested her head against my chest and exhaled deeply.
She had picked her owner; she was home.
That story is often repeated amongst my group of friends who
were there that day and we laugh at the memory of Brianne nearly screaming from
the sheer cuteness of the scene as she exclaimed, “Oh, my God! She looks like you!” I can still recall –
with great detail – the immediate sense of urgency I felt at needing her to
come home with me that day and the sense of horror when the cash machine Lisa
drove me to would only dispense half of my new puppy’s sticker price. I’ve
always been blessed with great friends – and Lisa is no exception, quickly taking
out her own bank card to lend me the balance.
The freckle-faced puppy came home with me, a rainbow-colored
bow adorning her neck. When I heard the crunch of gravel from Vinny’s car, I
met him at the front door with a familiar refrain.
“Don’t be mad…”
We named her Sydney, after my favorite red-haired vixen on Melrose Place played by Laura Leighton.
I am, after all, always and unapologetically a pop culture junkie. The rest of
Sydney’s story is a decade and a half chock full of wonderful memories, each
one coming back to me over the last few days as I prepared myself to carry out my
last act of love in helping this beautiful creature make her final journey.
Sydney running across
the green lawn of our Middle Island house, chew toy in mouth…
Sydney taking her
first swim in Lisa and Brianne’s pool, plunking down into the water after
slipping off the first step…Brianne shrieking in the background while Lisa and
I howled with laughter…
Our refrigerator
loaded with “Sydney” magnets from anywhere and everywhere we ever traveled…Las
Vegas, the Hoover Dam, Boston, Florida, Belize, to name a few…
The way we’d laugh at
how Sydney developed this soft little “woo-woo” sound to indicate her
impatience at having to wait for her meal-end treat of table scraps. I smile thinking
about how she wooed louder and louder the harder we laughed. And how we laughed
until our stomachs hurt…
The way we nicknamed
her “Woobie Girl” shortly after bringing her home…a nickname that would stay
with her throughout her life…
Sydney moving with the
speed of light to pilfer an unsupervised hot dog off the table during
barbecues…
Sydney rolling around
gleefully in the grass after just returning home from the groomers while her
fretful Daddy carried on about the money he’d just spent…
Cuddling in the bed
with Sydney as a puppy and as an adult, the soft feel of her fur between my
fingers, the warmth of her body pressed against me…
Sydney’s gentle kisses
on my nose and mouth, the intoxicating smell of her doggy breath…The look of happiness on Sydney’s face and dance of joy she did whenever one of us came home from work…
The very last sight of
Sydney taking her final, gentle breaths – under the kindly supervision of Dr.
Kevin Lynch, the veterinarian who has cared for her since the day we brought her
home – while Vinny and I wept and wept
and wept, knowing that we were doing the right thing but hating every second of
it…
**
This morning, I awoke to the sound of torrential rain. It
was as if the universe was in perfect synch with my emotions, weeping torrents
of tears with me for what was to come to pass this afternoon. It was a fitting
tribute to Sydney, courtesy of Mother Nature. The weather only heightened my sense
of overwhelming melancholy, and I found myself thinking of my failures when it
came to my sweet Sydney. I hope the majority of her memories of me are good
ones and that she’s forgiven me for the times when I may have raised my voice
in frustration – not over her, but more likely some inconsequential human problem
for which she was the vessel that received my angry tone or impatience. 
I hope Sydney forgives me for splitting with her other Dad,
hoping that she never felt for a second like I abandoned her, understanding
that she went to live with one Daddy and not the other because we both agreed
that she shouldn’t be split up from her younger brother, Kirby, or little
sister, Zoe. I hope she knows somehow that even though I often went to bed
crying during the ensuing years because I missed having her in my everyday life
so much that leaving her with her other Dad and doggy siblings was genuinely
done in what we both believed to be her best interests. I hope Sydney knew that
her daddies’ split from each other eventually brought two more wonderful people
who loved her unconditionally into her life, her “stepdads” Ot and Brian. I
hope she felt the four of us gathered around her yesterday to say our goodbyes
and spend one more afternoon with her. After a good portion of her adult lifetime
spent adhering to strict dietary restrictions due to some persnickety kidneys,
I hope she enjoyed her special meal today – steak and Teddy Grahams. Something
salty, something crunchy-sweet for her taste buds.
I hope she heard every one of my heartfelt thank you’s – for
her unconditional love, for her affectionate, gentle disposition, for her sense
of humor, for her compassion and companionship, for her sixth sense in knowing
when I needed one of her sweet kisses or a random woo-woo. And I hope, as she slipped into her sweet hereafter this
afternoon, that she sensed how much her other Dad and I loved her and that
choosing this time for her to make her journey across the Rainbow Bridge was
not done lightly or for any kind of human convenience and only to ensure that
she never went out in severe pain or suffering of any kind. She deserved
infinitely more than that, and I was determined to keep that promise I made to
her on the first day we met – that she would never suffer and that I would be
with her at the end.
My sweet, one-of-a-kind Sydney is gone now as I type this
through tears that feel like they may never stop. It’s times like this where I
happily push my agnosticism to the side and believe with unwavering certainty
in a place described in that infamous Rainbow Bridge story, where Sydney is
young again, her legs strong and steady, her eyesight restored. A place where the sunshine always beams down
on her – catching the red highlights in her fur – and gentle breezes caress her
beautiful face. In my mind’s eye, I see her meeting Scuffy for the first time
and being reunited with Branigan and Bam Bam and Chapman and Moyet, their
animal kingdom differences cast aside and all of them playing happily through endless
sunshine-filled days and cuddling together under starry moonlit nights. In the
sweet hereafter that I want – desperately – to believe in for Sydney, all
dietary constraints are gone and she has a never-ending supply of doggy treats
and hot dogs.
Most of all, I hope those last lines of the Rainbow Bridge
story prove true. That someday, when my own days are done, that I’ll be
reunited with her, that she’ll be there to greet me with wagging tail and
endless kisses like she did all those times I walked through the door after
work.
I want – no, need – to believe this today more than
anything else in the world:
Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge.
When an animal dies that has been especially close to
someone here, that pet goes to Rainbow Bridge. There are meadows and hills for
all of our special friends so they can run and play together. There is plenty
of food, water and sunshine, and our friends are warm and comfortable.
All the animals who had been ill and old are restored to
health and vigor. Those who were hurt or maimed are made whole and strong
again, just as we remember them in our dreams of days and times gone by. The
animals are happy and content, except for one small thing; they each miss
someone very special to them, who had to be left behind.
They all run and play together, but the day comes when one
suddenly stops and looks into the distance. His bright eyes are intent. His
eager body quivers. Suddenly he begins to run from the group, flying over the
green grass, his legs carrying him faster and faster.
You have been spotted, and when you and your special friend
finally meet, you cling together in joyous reunion, never to be parted again.
The happy kisses rain upon your face; your hands again caress the beloved head,
and you look once more into the trusting eyes of your pet, so long gone from
your life but never absent from your heart.
Then you cross Rainbow Bridge together....
***
Goodnight, sweet Sydney. I’ll love you and keep you in my
heart forever, my unforgettable Woobie Girl.
Sydney Liaguno-PersFebruary 26, 2000 – June 15, 2015
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