Farewell, My Big, Dumb, Farm Boy

I wasn't sure whether or not to post this essay. It's personal and probably overwrought, and it's definitely a departure from the silly, joyful, satirical nature of this blog . . . but I had to say goodbye to someone this week—the furriest, bestest, friend I've ever had or ever will have.

I wish there was a punchline waiting for you at the end. I do that sometimes - lead you down a path only to pull the rug out from under you 1000 words later - but alas, that is not the case here. This is just a sappy essay about me and my dog. And while I appreciate that my grief over losing a dog is personal and outweighed by the struggles that others regularly endure each day, I hope that this tribute will resonate with some of you.

At the end of the day, I am that guy. I love animals. I love dogs and I loved this dog so damn much.

All the images in this blog are AI generated based off of real photos.

Bringing him into my life was one the best decisions I've ever made and there is nothing about the time we spent together that I would do differently. We found each other. We graduated from school together. We suffered losses together. We got married together. We bought a house together. We started a family together, and as I look back at the life we shared, I have zero regrets.

My wife (then girlfriend) and I rescued him from a farm in Bumfuck County, Mississippi. The adoption facility told us that he was about a year old and had been neglected by his former owners. A border collie. A big, lanky, border collie. Bigger and lankier than any border collie you've probably come across. Allegedly, border collies are the smartest breed - but not this one. No, this border collie was a big, beautiful, blonde bimbo. He would run into glass doors, he lost track of tennis balls located directly under his nose, and despite countless attempts - he never figured out how to solve a yogurt cup that had flipped upside down. This border collie was a big, dumb, farm boy who cared only for feats of athleticism and courage - running, jumping, fetching, and barking at the mailman.

On our first night together, he ventured into the kitchen and unloaded a pool of noxious diarrhea onto the hardwood floors. No sooner after cleaning up his toxic mess, I noticed a bug crawling along the ridge of his back. I picked it off him, but then discovered another. Then another and another after that, quickly realizing that this big, dumb, farm boy was covered in ticks. Lots of them. So, my girlfriend and I spent the next several hours methodically inspecting his body and removing small parasites attached to his flesh - including one that had burrowed into his forehead, right between his eyes. Excising that one hurt him most - he let us know with an ear-piercing whelp that echoed off our poorly insulated apartment walls.

As you can imagine, this was an inauspicious start to our relationship, but my big, dumb, farm boy didn't run away, didn't snap at our fingers, and he didn't hide from us the next morning. He must have understood that we were trying to help, that was his new home, and we were his new family.

And we were.

Over the next several months I trained my big, dumb, farm boy how to walk on a leash and how to poop somewhere other than on our kitchen floor. My girlfriend would take him on runs in the morning and he'd jump in my car when I went to pick her up from the train in the evenings. We got him toys. Introduced him to frisbees and tennis balls - somehow this border collie had never been taught how to fetch by his former owners. This was a big, dumb, farm boy - a specimen of sinewy muscle and joints, bred to thunderously run, leap, and chase - and this travesty of neglect would soon be rectified.

When I would get home from work, my big, dumb, farm boy would be there to greet me with a wagging tail. He would then run to the back and sit patiently for me to open the door to our porch. When I opened it for him, he would rocket himself down the stairs and full-on sprint across the street to our local park. There he would lay on the grass, off-leash, staring back in the direction from whence he came, waiting for me to join him. Others at the park must have been so confused by this dog sprinting towards them. They must've been even more perplexed when he ignored them, turned, laid down, and waited. . . but that's what he did - he didn't bother anyone, he just waited for me to arrive 45 seconds later with a tennis ball. My big, dumb, farm boy had no interest in running away or engaging with others. This was our thing. This is what we did each day until my shoulder grew sore from launching balls into the treeline.

The next year, my big, dumb, farm boy helped me pull off the biggest win of my life. One evening, my girlfriend and I returned from dinner, and my big, dumb, farm boy met us at the door, ears pinned back, and wearing a necklace of hearts that read "Will you marry me?". In an instant, my girlfriend became my fiancé, and later that year, became my wife - now we were a proper family, no longer living together in sin.

Not too long thereafter I became a father for the first time. While my big, dumb, farm boy struggled to comprehend why this new member of the family would not yet engage him in tug-of-war, he nonetheless treated it with kindness. More babies arrived and my big, dumb, farm boy endured years of aggressive petting, eye pokes, and fur pulling in the years that followed - but he remained patient and gentle with all of them (this would pay off for him in later years as some of these tiny human companions matured into capable ball-throwers)

Years pass. Too quickly for comfort. Our lives get busier. His hair grays (as does mine). My wife has less time for morning runs, and his ability to run with her begins to wane. This is not unusual for agility breeds, I tell myself, they slow as they age. I watch as he becomes cautious with stairs and eventually chooses to avoid them altogether. At some point, my wife points out how my big, dumb, farm boy sleeps longer, more often, and sounder than before. Then one day, my call for him to come inside goes ignored. That's never happened before. Frustrated, I walk over to him, clap, and yell for him again, but soon realize that my big, dumb, farm boy has not grown disobedient, but is now big, dumb, and deaf.

I knew that he was getting older, but suddenly he was old.

The cosmic tragedy of God choosing dog for man's best friend is that their lives are far shorter than our own. At some point, they depart, and you must carry on without them. At some point, you mentally prepare for the inevitable.

At least you think you do.

I have occasionally contemplated what these final moments might be like for a couple of years now. I have tried to equip myself for how hard it would be for me to say goodbye. Unfortunately, nothing takes away the helplessness and anguish you felt watching them in their final days. Nothing makes it easier when you have to decide to relieve them of their pain. Nothing makes it easier when you must, for their sake, sever the bond you spent over a decade hardening.

That doesn't mean the journey spent together wasn't worth the tab that becomes due upon its conclusion. On the contrary, this pain is proof that what was lost had value and was worth losing. The pain provides us with a lesson that only pain can impart - life is fragile and our time on this planet is only borrowed, never owned. So, while I have zero regrets over the life I shared with my big, beautiful, sweet, caring, loyal, loveable, farm boy, it still hurts because it is supposed to hurt, and I am not ashamed to admit that I spent much of this weekend sobbing.

As my wife and I made final preparations for my big, dumb, farm boy, I asked her if we should bring some of his favorite things with him to make him feel comfortable. She paused momentarily and then replied "You're his favorite thing" - words that make me weep even as I type them.

Dear God, I hope her words hold truth. I hope my big, dumb, farm boy knew how much joy he brought into my life, how hard it was to see him struggle, and the lengths I'd go to see his big, dumb, face just one more time.

However, those final days of sorrow are not the moments by which he will be remembered. My wife recalls the time he dug a hole under our deck and returned to our porch door with a soot-covered nose. My kids each have their favorites, ranging from the time he caught a squirrel (which he let go), to when my littlest one fed him too much liverwurst - causing him to stink up the house with farts.

For me, I will remember running over to the park across the street after work. I will remember emerging from behind the bushes and feeling relieved to discover my big, dumb, farm boy, patiently waiting for me to arrive. I will remember watching him jump to his feet with excitement and how fervently his tail would wag when he saw me walking towards him with a tennis ball in my hand and 30 minutes to spend chucking it for him.

Thank you for being my best friend and for being MY favorite thing. Your time has ended but your mission was accomplished. Farewell, my big, dumb, farm boy.