In their young days we took them to a Groomer in Silverdale, Washington. She was an Asian lady who could speak very little English. When we went to pick up the dogs at the time scheduled they looked so pretty. This lady had done the best grooming these dogs have had before, or since. She pointed to Wiley and said, “This dog good dog”. Then she pointed to Mugsy and disapprovingly said, “This dog not good dog!” We could have told her that.
Wiley was the best dog ever. There is nothing more to say. The only bad thing he ever did is get into the food and drag it to the floor for all to share if we left the van for any amount of time. Wiley was very stealth, and he could get into the food no matter where and how high it was kept. If trained he could have been a champion in an agility competition. His level of intuition and empathy was off the charts. Wiley was a spectacular dog. The best I ever had.
That leaves me with Mugsy to discuss. Really, this is about Mugsy. The ‘bad dog’. Mugsy was a fun dog… a funny dog. Sometimes Mugsy had a sitting posture of Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh… head drooped down. Other times he would relax with butt in the air. I had pictures of these. Mugsy was so cute. But, sadly, most of my pictures have been lost to the cloud somewhere.
Mugsy instinctively knew if someone was a Preacher and would go for the ankle to bite. He felt the same about saggy pant gangster types. Preachers and Gangsters were fair ankle biting game. While we were parked at a church for the longest time Mugsy once chased the Preacher's son all around the parking lot of the church. I told the kid not to run so I could just pick up Mugsy and remove the threat, but he didn't listen. He ran. And so did Mugsy. Did Mugsy or the Preacher's son listen to me? Not at all.
Mugsy was bold and brave with a smidgen of knucklehead in the mix. Maybe more than a smidgen. He had enough cute and personality to get away with it. When we got him he was free, and the lady ended up giving us $100 to take him. The money was actually to help us get him fixed (we were poor, living in a van). My husband and I often joke that the lady paid us to take Mugsy.
Mugsy’s name was ‘Toby’ then, and he had been the lady's best friend’s dog. We suspect the lady’s best friend may have died, leaving the dog to her to find a home. We convinced the lady we would love and care for ‘Toby’ always, and we did.
The first thing we did was to change Toby’s name to Mugsy. A name we felt better suited to him. He had such a cute mug! And Mugsy was a bit thugsy. My husband and I have so many memories and Mugsy stories to tell. He was quite the character, and all toys belonged to him.
Fast forward to his later years. Mugsy was like a cat with nine lives. God healed him from a large tumor. He had back injuries and issues. He had seizures in his later years that seemed to have gone away in about these past eight months. I rescued Mugsy from the mouth of a pit bull. I am sure I could name more things, but the point is that Mugsy kept on.
Mugsy was a stout survivor. So much so that I prayed for his passing over these past six to eight months. Mugsy did not age well. He had a lot of anxiety and would wake me up nearly every one or two hours every night to pee. I didn't feel well with my own health issues. Add to that a serious lack of sleep. It was brutal and I became very impatient with Mugsy.
I started to think that tending to him would be the death of me. I wasn't certain who would go first. I am sure that the stresses of caring for him may have taken a year or two off my own life. My husband took him for a few months to help out until it became too much for him. Mugsy actually started doing better - sleeping longer with less anxiety - when I moved into my new trailer. This meant we all did better these past three weeks… until his last two nights. He became agitated again, and finally, on his last day, totally blind. Poor, poor, boy.
Over the past six to eight months I had wished and prayed that God would take Mugsy. He wasn't doing well. My husband would not have him put down, and ultimately we couldn't afford it on his final day. We prayed a lot for Mugsy over the years. But, God is in charge of life and death and His answer to my prayer was, “No”.
I had resigned myself to this waiting upon cruel and impending death. It is a most difficult thing to be a part of. Can I just say that I HATE sin. With every fiber of my being I hate it. It is because of sin that death entered - that we experience the knowledge of good AND evil. Death is evil, and the ONLY rescue and hope is in Jesus Christ! I hope that my beloved pets that have passed on are in Heaven. I desperately hope to see them there. But, this side of Heaven I cannot know.
God was showing me things through this experience with Mugsy. These were not lovely things. Rather these were things about myself that I do not like. Mugsy, in the end, exposed the worst in me. THIS IS A GIFT FOR WHICH I AM GRATEFUL.
Don't we just love that which we believe brings out the best in us! We generally hate that which exposes the truth of our depravity. We want to believe and consider only the good, never the evil. But, that is not in the contract - the covenant - for this life. The agreement is for the knowledge of good AND evil. God addresses the evil in our lives when we are His children. He brings us correction. If our pride and hard hearts do not allow for this, and we live in offense and rebellion of this, then we are doomed and will not be allowed entrance into His Kingdom as His child.
So, while Wiley was the best boy ever, I owe Mugsy the greater gratitude. Mugsy had the more difficult challenge of exposing the worst in me. Mugsy's path was not an easy one. It was a path of a warrior, fraught with dangers and obstacles which he met with fun, and ultimately temerity and tenaciousness.
In the end Mugsy had the greater and difficult task of bringing out the worst in me, and that is the greatest heartbreak. I feel he deserved better, but we (my husband and I) gave all we had to give to the circumstance because we love Mugsy. We, ourselves, are aging and often don't feel well. Add to that a lack of sleep and you get the perfect storm where everything then becomes a matter of how best for all to survive. We throw no one into danger to save our own hide. We protect and guard life. So while we, at times, stormed about ourselves - not doing it all perfectly with the greatest empathy and patience - our motivation, ultimately, was love.
I am sad Mugsy's last months and days weren't better. I am happy, for his sake, that he is home now. I thought I typed, “I am happy, for his sake, that he is gone now”, and looking back over my work I see the word ‘home’ instead of ‘gone’. Maybe God, in His kindness, is telling me something. I pray it is so. The death struggle is real, even when the quality of life is bad at best. When you love you want the best for the one you love, and sometimes the struggle may bring out the worst.
Thank you, Mugsy, for the difficult job of exposing the worst in me so I can bring it to God my Father (again) in surrender. May you rest in eternal doggie paradise.
