Building memories with Jack

The older Jack gets, the more I value my time with him. And the more I worry.

He's 12 now and pretty darned healthy. We've gone on two walks a day almost every day in the 2 years since we rescued him. And he keeps up pretty darned well, summer and winter.

But he's also had health issues. He had surgery on his leg when we first got him. When the vet first told me how much it would cost, my jaw dropped and the first words out of my mouth were, "I could buy a purebred champion for that." He nodded in agreement.

But the leg has held up magnificently. I can tell it's not perfect. He'll occasionally wobble when he's lifting his other leg to pee. I wouldn't be surprised if it went out on him entirely some day. But, hey, 2 years of two-a-day walks on a healthy leg has already been worth every cent.




He also has a perineal hernia, which is potentially more serious. It shows up as a big, soft bump on his butt because his intestine is going where it shouldn't. It causes him no pain, so I've held off on surgery, which could be fatal to a little guy his age. The surgery is no guarantee either. It could make him worse.

But no surgery could kill him too. So I worry.

I take hundreds, thousands, of pictures of Jack because I don't want to forget a moment of our time together. When others here have lost their beloved pups, I usually tell them that memories never die. I want to make sure I have some good ones.

It's amazing to me that I've fallen so head over heels in love with a 4-pound dog, the epitome of everything I made fun of just a few years ago. At a glance, he has few redeeming qualities beyond his spinning trick. He has very few teeth left. Bad breath. He's the king of yap. He occasionally pees in the house. He's always under foot.

But he pays it all back with unconditional love and a heart that belies his frame. He's afraid of nothing, not even Eddie, who used to beat him up. I think that's where our bond started. He placed all his trust in me to stop those beatings. And I did. I couldn't let him down after all he'd been through.

A couple days ago, I dug through the microfilm at work to find the classified ad that brought Jack into my life. I don't want to forget it. It's astonishing to me how much love came from these three tiny lines.

They brought me my champion.

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