I had all of this back to school commentary to write about today, but honestly none of it matters right now. 
Yesterday, my mother woke me up and told me that my dog, who lived at my grandparents house, was sick, and that we had to go over there to help them lift her into the van. She was a golden retriever and far too heavy for them to lift on their own. So we took her to the vet where we were told that she had had a stroke, and that they would keep her overnight for observation. This morning, my grandmother called the vet to see how she was doing, and we were told that she had died during the night.
My mom, sister, and I lived with my grandparents for much of my life. One Sunday, Jessie and I came home from our father’s house to find that Bear, my grandparents’ dog, had had puppies…in our shower. Being six years old, and rather anti shower, at the time, this didn’t bother me in the least. I forget how many there were, but the main two were later named Bailey and Paz. Bailey went to my cousins (they liked him because he was huge. Plus he had a tendency to pee on our other cousin, John, every single time he picked him up.), and Paz went to us. 
Because I am the older sister, they gave me the privilege of both choosing which puppy we wanted and naming her. I was a quiet and studious kid at the time (What on earth happened to me?), so I decided on the quiet puppy that often sat off by itself. After reading an entire baby name book, I picked out the name Paz. The book told me that Paz means “the golden one” in Hebrew, and, being the clever child I was, I put together “golden retriever” and “the golden one”. Later on in life, I found out that Paz also means peace in Spanish, which is amazing. I am a total flower child, and I plan on minoring in Spanish in college. It was just meant to be.
This dog was my baby. Our hair color even matched. We grew up together. She was the friendliest dog that I have ever met. It broke my heart when we moved out of my grandparents’ house because we had to choose to leave her behind. They live on about 20 acres, and we live on a 1/2 acre. She wouldn’t have been happy with us.
She was part of the family, and my dear Pazzy will forever be missed.
Paz Dugan
1999 – July 20, 2010
3 Comments
I hope it gets easier :)
(Random side note because I find it very odd that we're so similar. I've also planned on minoring in Spanish. This just keeps getting weirder.)