Quinn D. Gellar 1990-2006

He wasn't the smartest dog I've ever known. He was an enormous crybaby; I swear the dog would yelp before he got an owie, he was that big a weenie. He dug, everywhere, and in the most inconvienent places. Even in the last days of his life, with hind legs so crippled he could barely hobble, he would stagger out into the garden (looking for something particularly tender and blooming) and dig like a frenzied gopher, excavating holes large enough for ten grinches (plus two)...

And that's to say nothing of his maniac obsession with crapping in the vegetable garden.

He was a GI tract with legs, who would eat anything and everything. Back before my bride and I were my bride and I, he scoffed an entire BOX of valentine's candy while we were out for a walk. It will take a long time for me to forget the vet's display of chocolate-and-red-tinfoil regurgitant (I think he wanted to shame us for leaving Quinn alone with the chocs...)

He would bark at random events (although anyone on the porch was fair game) and would erupt in a panting frenzy whenever a meal or a chase were offered. His high speed figure-eight scramble when excited and happy was an idiotic joy to watch.

He sure was a humper. He even tried to hump Mister Prickles, his adored hedgehog toy, regardless of the fact that M.P. was only 6 inches tall. So he tore his legs off, instead.

He never quite got over losing his cat friends Baby Malcolm and Nicodemus.

And, oh, did he love Deb. He never got to sleep ON her bed, back when she slept on the mattress on the floor but he would lie right NEXT to it so he could put his head on her covers. He never quite took to me - I always had a hard word or a sharp smack for him when he would dig or crap in the garden or "pound air" before sunup...all my pets and caresses never quite made up for the scoldings that would make him cry.

I'm sorry I didn't hug you more, Quinn.



THE BEST PLACE TO BURY A DOG

There is one best place to bury a dog.

If you bury him in this spot, he will come to you when you call - come to you over the dark frontier of death - down the well-remembered path and to your side again.
And though you call a dozen living dogs to heel, they will not growl at him, or resent his coming, for he belongs there.

People may scoff at you, who see no lightest blade of grass bent by his footfall, who hear no whimper, people who may never really have had a dog.

Smile at them, for you shall know something that is hidden and well worth the knowing.

The one best place to bury a good dog is in the heart of his master.