You’re all familiar with this caution, but here goes: The following contains a discussion of losing a beloved pet and may be disturbing to some individuals. Reader discretion is advised.

Caution number two: This blog post contains some photos. If they do not come through in your emailed version, please go to my website, www.jajanceauthor.com. Locate the word “Blog” and click on that. If the photos still don’t appear, send me a note at jajance@me.com.

Now, cautions aside, here goes.

For two thirds of our marriage, Bill and I have been big-dog people. Within ten days of tying the knot, we brought home two eight-week old golden-retriever puppies, Nikki and Tess, named after Nicola Tesla. Our thinking was that their presence would be a help in blending our two families, and it worked.

A few years later we took in an elderly platinum golden retriever named Mandy and fospiced (A combination of fostering and hospice care) for six months before we learned what we had been told was arthritis was really bone cancer.

After Mandy came a tiny pound puppy named Boney who grew up to be half German shepherd and half Irish wolfhound. He was the bridge between our original Goldens and our next pair—red-dog Goldens that time, Aggie and Daphne, named after Agatha Christie and Daphne du Maurier. By the way, in Boney’s eyes, Daph could do no wrong. She could pull on her ears or tail and he wouldn’t move a muscle. If Aggie came too close to him, she was greeted with growls and bared teeth!

You see how this works: Dogs come into our lives and never stay as long as we want them to. In 2010, with Daph the only dog left in the household, things changed. That’s when we found an abandoned long-haired miniature Dachshund running in the middle of a neighborhood street. After trying unsuccessfully to find her owner, we named her Bella, and she showed us the benefits of dog downsizing.

Once we lost Daph, Bella was lonely, so we went searching for another Doxie and came home with a little gray and white ball of fluff we named Jojo. And once Bella was gone, along came Mary.

Bella and JoJo

Where Bella had been a dignified older-lady of a dog, Jojo was a scamp. I think you can see that in the side-by-side framed portrait of the two of them together. For years Bella had slept in a Mercedes-shaped dog bed. Jojo tore it to pieces within a matter of weeks, and she did the same thing to every dog bed or blanket that followed.

Jojo didn’t need a calendar to know which day it was. On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings, she parked under the dining room table waiting for our personal trainer to arrive. And she didn’t need a clock to tell what time it was, either. Each day, at 2 PM, on the dot, she would level an unblinking stare in my direction, letting me know it was dinner time. And if I didn’t deliver the goods fast enough, she would grab her most obnoxious squeaky toy and squawk it until I got the message.

In December, seven and a half years ago when Jojo was five, she went out into the back yard at noon looking just fine. Three hours later, when it was time for dinner, she was suddenly a paraplegic. A trip to the nearest pet hospital told us she needed neurosurgery on her back—to the tune of $13,000. Bill and I looked at each other and said, “Well, I guess we know what we’re giving each other for Christmas.”

Her post-surgery recovery period last for two months, with me carrying her in and out to do her duty, but one day late in January she was able to squat by herself, and we were good to go.

Our house has two sets of very steep steps, one leading to the doggie yard and the other to the back yard. We installed dog ramps. Our doggie door was built for large dogs as opposed to one with a three-inch inseam and a bad back. So I became Jojo’s doggie door, letting her in and out several times a day, whenever she caught my eye and let me know she needed to go.

Mary is tall enough to let herself in and out, but Jojo would wait for me to open the door. Except, of course, when she wanted to go out and bark at the dog that lives up the street. Then she could go out the dog door just fine.

On Wednesday night week ago, when I let the dogs out for the last time, Mary was halfway down the ramp when Jojo spotted a bunny lurking behind the fence. She went flying off the steps to chase it. The next morning she was hobbling and having trouble controlling her legs. Another round of surgery wasn’t possible. For one thing, I’m eighty years old now. Caring for her during a two month recover period just wouldn’t be possible, so on Friday of last week we had to have her put down.

We’ve missed Jojo terribly this past week, and so has Mary. Mary has moved her dog bed away from the TV set and now has it positioned between Bill’s and my chairs. Without functioning as Jojo’s doggy door, I’m having to make up the 700 steps that usually came along with that.

But here’s the thing, losing it the ultimate cost of loving, and I wouldn’t change a thing. We loved you Jogee—as we came to call her—and we miss you, but we’re glad we had you for as long as we did.

As for that $13,000 surgery bill? Amortized over seven and a half years, that comes out to only $141 a month—a small price to pay for having that sweet little scallawag in our lives.

JoJo