Rupert walked with me around our property on Monday picking up sticks and just giving it the once over.Rupert my big old yellow lab loved to go out front and do a walk around. Rupert had been particularly loud these past few weeks but I had written his attitude off to old age and arthritis.
By Monday afternoon he was laying on the daybed in my office just staring at me with his big golden brown eyes,I tried to read into them but he would just close them and go back to sleep. I took breaks from my projects to lay with him and love him.
Tuesday morning I awoke to find Rupert laying on his pillow bleeding. His anal gland had ruptured. We took him immediately in to our veterinarian who was surprised that he had managed to go as long as he did. Rupert had a raging infection down one side of his leg, nearly a foot long, part of his tail and other leg, this infection had been festering for quite sometime.
Rupert's loyalty to always be at my side was not going to be diminished by an infection. He had maintained a smile all week and weeks before always running to meet me at the door, jumping in my husbands spot in the bed even if it meant missing breakfast. How very physically hard this must have been for him. Driven by his love and loyalty, what we as people could learn from these creatures we share our lives with.
Tonight we wait. Dr. Frick has done the best he could, he operated on Rupert to remove damaged tissue and put drains in to keep the wound clear of any more infection. This is a hard procedure for a young and healthy dog but Rupert, my sweet old "pancake" is just that old.
So there are things I could tell you about how he followed me everywhere and was forever my shadow and would sleep with his head on my lap, how he would insist on always being at my feet when I sat and at my finger tips when I walked and next to me when I napped. And now I am sorry I didn't toss the ball that last time he wanted me to because I wanted to go in and get a cola, or told him "no" when he wanted to go swimming, on Monday just because I didn't want to have to dry him off before we went in "again".
So when Rupert comes home tomorrow and wants to go swimming, eat ice cream or do any of the other "Rupert things" then that is what we will do.
It took almost losing him to realize Rupert doesn't care if the laundry is done he just cares about me. And he deserves the same from me. Loyalty and love is not something one can show when it is convenient, but to be given entirely, freely and constantly. No matter man or beast I shall work to remember the lesson Rupert taught me this week. How to truely purely love another being.
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