FEBRUARY 14, 1997 - SEPTEMBER 15, 2009
With a personality befitting a puppy born on Valentine’s day, Ginger was the sweetest of canine compadres. Her crowning glory as a domesticated quadruped was mastery of the "shake" command, performing (with both hands!) contentedly and endlessly. Her patience for stupid humans clamoring for the trick was perhaps a dedicated and concerted effort to make up for the tragic fact that she absolutely loathed having her picture taken, or for her staunch refusal to follow through on the crucial “bring it back” aspect of playing fetch. Her heartbreakingly innocent brown eyes methodically observed when our family took their plates to the coffee table to dine while lazing on the couch. Adorably following suit, Ginger would tote mouthfuls of dry food from her bowl in the laundry room. After trotting back to the living room, she would carefully dump her dinner onto the carpet underfoot and nosh slowly, gazing up at the tv, before dutifully making the trip again and again until she was either full or the evening news was over.
The most visibly expressive animal I have ever encountered, her cute and comically large triangular ears were a clear giveaway of her every doggie emotion. They perked up at the sound of an opening garage door, and were immediately plastered down at the first hint of thunderstorms, vacuum cleaners, or the absolute terror of 4th of July fireworks. As frustratingly bored with the frequently dreary pacific northwest weather as any of us, she would sometimes sigh audibly and flop down on the kitchen rug with a furrowed brow that was only soothed by a vigorous butt scratch. Ever humble and polite, she had a strange predilection for sleeping behind bathroom doors, but out of respect for your privacy she would get visibly embarrassed and agitated if you went to pee without shooing her out. Loyal to the end, a precise whiny pitch of “OWWWW STOP PUNCHING MEEE”; at a certain volume would rouse her into attack dog mode, rocketing out of any sleepy corner of the house straight to my defense (a standard go-to secret weapon which settled many a quarrel with my younger brother).
She lived to be an old, if not elderly, lady with a formerly “we’re not really dog people” family who loved her dearly; and who dotingly continued to reward her with treats even though she long since ceased to have an interest in eating them. Instead she would get them a little slobbery and proceed to mischievously hide them between the couch cushions. A lifetime of looming heart problems quickly and suddenly sent Ginger down a path of incurable illness, but not pain. She lived out her final days under the loving charge of my mother, a registered nurse and otherwise professional and personal expert at caring for and comforting the injured, ill and ailing. Too weak to even eat on her own, small bits of her favorite people foods were hand-fed to her. Sensing her dying wish, my mother knew that she was at her tongue-lolling happiest in a moving automobile, and would carefully carry her to and from the car for the last “wanna go for ride? wanna go for ride!?”s of her life after she lost the ability to walk.
Ginger was peacefully euthanized this afternoon, in the comfort of her home in Washington state, in a shady patch of the yard where she loved to nap. A vet who had just come from delivering a litter of puppies oversaw her crossover to the great upstate farmhouse in the sky, while her head rested in my father’s hands. She is survived by Dexter the cat, who will miss bossing her around and chasing her through the house and (weirdly, of his own volition) accompanying her on W-A-L-Ks. Her ashes are to be scattered along the backyard fence, where she delighted in burying treasure troves of delicious socks nabbed from the dirty laundry, and running backandforthandbackandforth, excitedly greeting passersby through the slats, with an extra loud voice for those on bicycles or with other dogs.
