Dear Mugford,
I thought I would try to talk to you in a beautiful, quiet place where I know no one in the world goes: my website.
Look! I’m starting with a joke. Today might be a little easier than yesterday. The truth is, I am just sitting on the couch trying to process these words through some formal gesture—that they might translate into a universal language-less knowing that will accompany you to wherever it is that dead dogs go.
I thought about writing from the porch where we normally sit when I’m working on my computer, but it is still hard to look at the birds that we spent so many summers watching together. There are a lot of “hards” I didn’t think of when we knew it was time to say goodbye. I foolishly thought I’d feel some relief. You wouldn’t be struggling to get up to walk anymore. No more pain. No more humiliating falls up the porch steps. But you, my enormous English Mastiff, big as you were both in body and spirit, have left a large aching hole in the house. All day I feel like I am tiptoeing around it. Without warning I’ll fall in, and there I am on my hands and knees pressing my nose into the hardwood floor of the empty space that was once your dog bed. I run my fingers over the scuff marks in the wood made from your gigantic paw nails. I open the ring box over the sink and smell the bundle of fur I collected after I held and comforted you on the porch for the last time. The fur that fell as you comforted me back and flopped a knowing paw on my shoulder before we took that dreaded drive. And then life pulls me out of the hole again. Maeve needs to be driven to soccer. Dinner needs to be made. Henry has a piano lesson. And time continues to move you further away.
I cleaned the drool off the French doors almost immediately after we put you down. I couldn’t bear to see it. Now I can’t bear that the doors are still clean. In the over 10 years we’ve lived in this house that’s never happened. Even now, with you 4 days gone, a bundle of your hair will blow across the floor like tumble weed. It lets loose from some corner no matter how many times I sweep or vacuum. I know I have to accept that I’ll be finding remnants of your life with us for many years to come.
Hey, remember that time you shook your head and your drool hit the ceiling? That was incredibly disgusting. Or the time Bert and I were watching a show, and you let out a fart so foul that you raised your heavy head and looked at us like, “Damn, it stinks like shit in here,” and you got up and left. I thought I wouldn’t miss the ugly things that came with your bigness. Your rhino-sized shits. Slipping on your drool. And the many times I stopped in my tracks as I was rushing around because of something or another and yelled, “Mugford! Why do you always have to be such a fucking mountain in the middle of everything!” I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry you couldn’t be the lap dog you always wanted to be. I’m sorry for the many small dogs that would visit and effortlessly leap up onto the couch while you were stuck on the floor letting out a big, “oh fuck that little shit” sigh.
I took our new little shit, Arlo for a walk this morning. It was the same route we used to take when you were young and enjoyed walks. I ran into a woman who asked if Arlo was friendly. “I think so?” I said, unknowingly. “He’s just a puppy.” And she replied, “Oh, he seems so calm, so behaved.” I told her that he had an elderly Mastiff to show him the ropes. And she immediately knew who I was, where I lived, and the Mastiff I was talking about. “Oh, we always admired that beautiful dog.” It’s true, you’ve always been something of a celebrity, and not all dogs get that. When you’d accompany me outside to fill the bird feeders or wait for the kids to get off the bus, cars would often stop just to look in awe at you. Random adults and kids would often smother you with affection without warning. And you would always take it, or rather, you received it. Always thankful for attention however it came. I’ll never forget that time we took you to the Lowell Folk Festival and you were treated as one of the main attractions. We couldn’t turn a corner without someone wanting to pet you and talk about you. We heard, “Wow! look at that dog!” constantly, and the not-so-clever line we’ve gotten your entire life, “When are you going to put a saddle on that thing?!”
Yeah, I won’t miss that.
When we were grappling with the decision to put you down. I said to Bert, “It feels like a chapter is ending.” And Bert said, “Are you kidding? Mugford is the volume that holds so many chapters.” And it’s true—you were the dream of how we saw our future. A big gentle dog that would guide us through so many monumental milestones. Our first home. Our marriage. Your largeness a faithful and concerned anchor at my feet as I waited through the labor pains of all three of our children. And you always greeted each baby with simple, unequivocal love. You saw us all through so many sleepless nights, the many tears, and so much laughter. You spent more time in the house than any of us. I can count on one hand how many times I have been alone here without you. And just like that, in a terrible instant—you have disappeared, and I am so very lonely with you gone.
Bert and I sat on the porch most of the weekend in what felt like our own private memorial service. The kind of lonely commemoration only animals receive because, well, if it’s not your animal no one truly feels it or understands. We talked about all of the things you must have seen from your various vantage points in and around the house. At one point we moved outside and placed two Adirondack chairs in a sunny spot in the yard, and let ourselves soak in the sun, just like you loved to do, no matter how hot it was. “We are enduring that one true thing, aren’t we?” Bert said. “The certainty of death. It is never certain that something will be born, but once it’s born, it is certain that it will die.” We always knew the day would come. I look at Arlo, and I know I am beginning the process again. A new volume with barely one chapter yet to fill it. He’s been keeping me company a lot, licking my tears away, ruining shoes, and pissing and shitting on the floor. For a little guy, he’s a mighty big distraction. I am thankful for that.
Mugford, you were our closest friend. I wish we could have given you more. It’s not fair how much you loved us so unconditionally despite all of our flaws—always taking a back seat to the needs of others. When we were saying goodbye, I rested the entire weight of my body on top of you. You always loved that, to feel the literal weight of someone’s affection, no matter how heavy. You had a body built to hold it. I hope that you felt me as the needle entered your vein, and you drifted away from us. Maybe you saw us from above your big beautiful snore, your last breath, my head resting on your head, your head in Bert’s hands—and us both not knowing what else to say other than another true thing: “You are such a good boy. Such a good boy. Such a good boy…you’re Him.”
