With a heavy heart, I report Millie is no longer with us.  I don’t know what happened.  She went outside this morning and went under the porch steps — one of her favorite places to hang out.  But she didn’t come out again.  I checked on her tonight when I put her supper out.  She was non-responsive.  When I pulled her out, she was limp and cool to the touch.

She had matured into a good pup.   The above pictures were from August, 2011.  She adopted us in the summer of 2004 (we think she was almost a year old, so we figure she was born in 2003) while I was deployed to Bahrain.  Here’s how she looked then:

She came to us with some issues that we never quite figured out.  She was timid in a lot of areas.  But she was also friendly and liked to be petted and brushed.  Over the weekend, I brought her in the house, and we had a short bouncing section of joy at being in the house.  She knew she had to use her house manners, but she was a joy to interact with.

She rarely came when she was called, but she would always come to the truck.  If Millie got loose, one of us would keep track of where she was going, and the other would get the truck.  She would come to the truck, we’d put her inside, and she’d get her ride home — even if it was only across the street.

She loved to run at the ranch.  But after she’d done a few “laps” she’d hang out with us.

We called her the Postal Early Warning System.  She would bark when the postman’s truck pulled up and park across the street.  She would bark as he walked through the yard after slipping our mail into the slot.  Finally, she would bark once more when he walked back to the truck after he’d walked around the block.

Since we lost Dazzle, Millie got to spend more time n the house, and she was always very good, which was earning her more house time.  In fact, instead of putting her in the garage at night for the last couple of weeks, I’d been walking her and bringing her in the house for the night.  I’m glad we got more time together before the end, but this death still feels untimely.

For the first time in I can’t remember how long, we’re dogless.  In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever not had a dog.  Even with four cats remaining, it feels very, very strange.

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