Saying goodbye to two old Friends
Mayday - December 12, 2008
My sister Tami brought Mayday to the Farm a couple of years ago. He was a retired racehorse and the son of Seattle Slew. Mayday’s previous owners decided they wanted to retire and travel in a RV, so they quickly became unable to care for either Mayday or his buddy Forest. Mayday had back leg problems, thus the reason he was retired from racing. Normally his leg didn’t bother him, but he was getting up in age and soon his leg was beginning to bother him on a regular basis. He loved living on the farm and in the pasture where he could roam with a few of our other horses. Mayday was a big teddy bear. When he was put in a pasture with our two spirited geldings, they would pick on him but he would not fight back. In fact, if they were fed together, they would push him away from his food, and he would then just walk away. So the two geldings were put in a separate pasture, and Mayday again enjoyed his pasture along with his girlfriend, “Mary” and two other horses. When I would walk out to the pasture, he would come to me when I called him. He was very well trained, not just as a racehorse, and he just loved life. I was able to ride Mayday a couple of times and, since he was so tall, it took me a few tries to get up on his saddle. He preferred English of course, but I am a western gal, so he put up with me. On December 10, 2008, I came home to find Mayday not able to walk. His back leg was bothering him again and it had swollen quite a bit. We knew our vet was coming out the next day, so we kept an eye on him. On the 13th when the vet came, he took some blood and gave him an examination. This problem had happened before, but this time, Mayday wasn’t really able to move, except to hop backwards, for several days. The test results revealed that he was very near liver failure, so it was decided that Mayday would need to be put down.
Now me, being a pet sitter who cannot handle watching animals suffer or die, left the farm and my sister stayed with him. When I arrived home early morning, Mayday had already been put down. I didn’t think it was going to happen that fast. He was lying out by the hay with a tarp over him prior to being removed. I sat on the dirt and lifted up the top part of the tarp. I looked @ Mayday’s eyes, which were still open, and sat there for quite awhile just talking to him and crying. I knew it was best for Mayday to have put him down; he was no longer in pain. It just doesn’t make it any easier on an animal lover and owner.
Mayday will be missed. He was a great horse, and I have been blessed to have him with us for the last two years, bringing a lot of joy into my heart.
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Max - December 17, 2008
Max came into my life in February 2003. My son, Justin, and I lived in Hawthorne, CA. I belonged to several “no-kill” dog rescue groups, and the leader of one of the groups called me to see if I would consider fostering a dog. Well, to be honest, I really didn’t want to foster a dog because I knew I would want to keep him. Besides, I wasn’t even sure if my new landlord would even allow me have a dog. I reluctantly accepted. Justin and I drove to a parking lot to meet this lady and we were handed a leash with a tan & white dog on the other end of it.
Justin plopped this dog on his lap, and we headed home. We decided to name him Max, even though the rescue lady had named him Chu-Chu. Now, who names their dog Chu-Chu? He just looked like a “Max” to me. We learned that he was rescued from an abusive owner but didn’t know much more about him. Max turned out to be an excellent guard dog and, living next to a gang-infested area, that was a good thing. I learned the next day that he didn’t like to be touched on his stomach. I had given him a bath and tried to dry him off and he nearly took my face off. He was also food territorial. Max loved to go for walks along the Strand in Hermosa Beach, but he could be peculiar. First of all, I remember a time that we walked and walked along the Strand. Max did very well on our long walk. Well that is, until we turned around. For some odd reason, Max decided it was now his territory and he would try to jump @ the other dogs, or people roller bladding or riding their bikes. I had to hold him back. In fact, he tried to jump this one little sheltie, and he actually broke his collar. I had to get Max off this poor thing by twisting his ear. I kept apologizing over and over again to the Sheltie’s owner. I then had to wrap his lease around his neck, since he had broken his collar. After that experience, I had to use a training (pokey) collar on Max and it worked very well.
In the first three years that I had Max, I always told everyone that I had a psycho dog that needed psychotherapy. Max lived with me in Hawthorne until we moved to Laveen, AZ to live with my sister and BIL on their farm, in February of 2006. We were moving to a 10-acre farm with four other dogs, and several horses. Max had never seen a horse until we drove up that day, and of course he barked. He seemed to get along with Paco (black lab); Pickles (black shishu); Zoë (white/gray shishu) and Pop-A-La (½ Coyote). There were a couple scuffles here and there and we learned pretty quickly that Max had to eat by himself.
In the three years, that Max lived on the farm; he would go hiking with me in South Mountain. He wasn’t too fond of all the rocky trails. I still remember the time that I bought him doggie booties that were supposed to help dogs walk on hot concrete and rocks. I tried putting them on Max and he just kept throwing them off. I tried again to put them back on, very determined that he would wear the darn things. As I was putting them on for the fourth time, I looked up and saw Max’s gums & teeth showing. That was Max’s way of telling me “No”. So I said fine; you can just walk on the rocks, which he did. Max did several 1,500 foot elevation gain hikes with me, and always took a very long nap after one of our adventures. Max loved going for truck rides, but due to the summer heat of AZ, he preferred going mostly in the winter and fall. He didn’t care where we went; he just wanted to be with his mommy. He also loved being in the front yard. In the mornings when I would get up @ the crack of dawn, Max would follow me to the pig food and wait patiently for me to give him a handful of the food that he loved to munch on, while I tended to the pigs and chickens. Max was a hunter and anytime a baby bird fell out of a tree, if I didn’t get to it first, Max would.
By this time we had seven dogs and one of those dogs is named “Rocky”, a bull terrier. My niece got Rocky on Craig’s list, and brought him to the farm one weekend. Rocky never went back home with her. Rocky and Max were both male-dominate dogs. They would get into mischief together, and quite a few small scuffles. Rocky was normally in the backyard and Max would be in the front yard with all the other dogs. One night Rocky was out front while I was away house-sitting. My sister heard all this commotion late @ night. She went outside to investigate and found Rocky attacking Max. Unfortunately, the other dogs had joined in the fight as well, and were going after Max. I later learned from my vet, that other dogs would join in a fight when they see a dog down…”it’s the pack mentality.” I did not learn about this fight until my sister had sent me a text message just before I went into church. I did not see her text until after church and it had already been well over 12 hours since the attack. My sister and I drove Max to the emergency vet clinic since it was a Sunday. Max had several deep wounds, but would recover. It cost over $1,600.00 to fix Max. It was understood from then on, that Rocky and Max must always be kept apart. This was working pretty well, until December.
On December 17th, I came home and found Rocky loose. I didn’t see Max, so I just assumed that my sister had put Max in the house, so Rocky could run around the front yard, as she has done in the past. I grabbed Rocky and had a hold on him when all of a sudden I saw something out of the corner of my eye. I looked over and saw Max struggling to get up and walk towards me. I then realized that he had several wounds on him. Rocky tried to lunge at him, and I kicked him on the side. I put Rocky in the backyard and took Max into the house. I checked his wounds, which were bleeding pretty badly. I called my sister in tears asking what happened. She and David swear that they did not let Rocky out. I called my vet several times before they returned my call. I took Max in and my vet, who had fixed his last wounds from Rocky, said there was a lot to do, but he thought Max would be okay.
I told my vet that I wanted to know about all options. One was to perform surgery on him again, and the second was to put him down. You see, even if I paid another $1,400.00, I just couldn’t see myself putting Max in that same position on the farm, where sooner or later Rocky would get out again and go after him. I kept looking into Max’s eyes and telling him that I was so sorry, while petting and hugging him. I just could not put Max through that pain, over and over. I called my mother in tears and soon came to the decision that it was best for Max to put him down.
The vet and his staff were wonderful. I cried so hard that I had the staff crying along with me. I couldn’t be in the room with Max, so I said my goodbyes and gave him one last hug. I walked out of that vet’s office crying so hard that I was barely able to see while driving to do my pet sits.
I fell into a deep depression because I miss Max so much. I waited to tell Justin about what happened until after Christmas. I had just visited Justin and Laura the weekend before Christmas and had planned on telling him then, but they were so excited about Christmas that I just couldn’t bring myself to spoil all their excitement.
It’s now been over three and a half weeks since putting my beloved dog Max down. I have only now gone a whole 72 hours of not crying. Well, that is, until I began typing this story, so now I have found myself crying again.
I have gone to the Pound and the Humane Society, looking at female dogs, right after losing Max, but I felt it was too soon. Tami thought it would be best if I got a female dog. Today, however, I found myself @ the Pound again looking at the dogs. I saw a black, female lab, as well as a mix female dog. I kept walking up and down the aisles, looking at all the dogs, but this skinny-little dog just kept calling to me. She was the happiest dog, even in her predicament. She was always wagging her tail, and loved to lick my fingers, through the bars. I asked to see the 2-year-old female mix. She was skin & bones, and looked like she had gotten caught up in some type of fencing because she had an old scar down her side. She wagged her tail when she saw me walk up to her. I asked if I could take her out to the yard. The volunteer brought her out, and she seemed to be a happy dog. Apparently, she was found on the streets, and it looked like she hadn’t eaten in quite awhile.
I hung out in the yard with this stray, and I noticed she was trying to retrieve a ball under the fence. So, I asked the volunteer if I could see the ball. So, I threw the ball and she raced over to it and brought it back to me. So apparently, she loves to play ball. We played ball for quite awhile, as I waited for my sister to come and check her out. When the volunteer gave me some treats, I asked her to sit, and she did. So, apparently, she had some type of training. I wondered if this dog could talk, what would she tell me. What sort of life did she have, and how did she end up half starved to death?
When Tami arrived, she seemed to like her as well. I was asked if I still wanted to see the female lab, and I told Tami that if it was okay with her, I wanted this dog, the underdog, so to speak. She looked at me with these saddened eyes, just wanting to be loved. So we said that we would take her. We filled out the paperwork, and tomorrow she will be spayed. I will be able to pick her up in the afternoon. So, after losing the only two animals on the farm that were mine, I now have a new dog with new adventures. Tomorrow, we will welcome “Willa” home (my mother named her).
Stay tuned for new adventures with Willa and me.
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on the back porch. Well, with all the training I need to do, I brought it back in today, washed it down (spider webs and all) and got it ready to use. Unfortunately, I was unable to find the DVD that went with it, so I had to call the company and order a new one.
and thought of me.
