Are we ready, am I ready?

The drive home from the shelter was difficult. We both had tremendous amounts of guilt. Honestly, not as much about Tawny, as she truly, truly was not the right dog for us or for June, but quite a bit about being uncertain of Sasha.

And that was me. I was the one that said, unhappily, that I didn’t think Sasha was the dog for us. And it wasn’t the resource guarding; it wasn’t the border collie energy level. It was that she wasn’t Smokey.

Moree was fate. Gollie had been C’s dog of 15 years. But he’d also had a border or aussie mx named Napoleon (Nappy) during his teen years. They ended up having to put Nappy down because he was a danger to himself and others. But C loves the borders and aussies, so when we were at the Nevada Humane Society arranging for Gollie to be cremated, and Moree was brought in to be surrendered, well, it was fate.

The decision to get Smokey was the deliberate decision to go from being a one dog household to a two dog household. There wasn’t anything we were missing, just something we were looking to add.

When we lost Moree, we were devastated, but we had learned that we weren’t exactly the best pet parents for an aussie or border, so when we began looking for our next dog, in no way were we looking for a dog like Moree. Granted, Junebug channels him sometimes, which is fine, but we were most definitely not looking to replace him. June didn’t have any shoes to fill.

With Smokey, though… Smokey had been the perfect dog for us. Everything about him, except for maybe size, was what I want in a new dog- sweet, patient, mellow, cuddly, good with people, good with other dogs (well, except for GSDs, and bouncy labs). Honestly, Smokey’s personality in another body, maybe just a smaller one.

No new dog is going to be Smokey. I can’t hold them to that standard. Its not fair to the dog, and its not fair to me. Letting go is part of the grieving process, and I have to be able to do it.

But Smokey was my dog, so very much my baby. There’s not the guilt issues with his death that there were with Moree’s, none of the what if’s that led to both C and I still randomly crying months after Moree’s death. Smokey’s time was Smokey’s time. So on many levels it feels like we’ve gotten over losing Smokey much more easily than we got over losing Moree.

And yet, I’m having a hard time opening my heart up to another dog, for the simple reason that they aren’t Smokey.