My dog died coming up on four weeks ago. That’s kind of misleading. We put her down. She was something more than 17 years old, a lab mixed with something else, probably pit bull from the shape of her head. She was deaf, increasingly blind, and so stiff from arthritis that it got hard for her to jump on the bed or the couch. The last week, she wasn’t eating much. And considering that I had cooked for her for about three years — organic, same stuff we ate only without salt or onions or garlic — that was a big thing. So we took her to the vet. The sedative they gave her turned a stiff old dog into a soft floppy pooch. It made me realize how much pain she had been in during the last months. Did I wait too long? Did I keep her around for me?

Katie came into our lives when she was three and a half. It was summer 1996 and I had started freelancing full time, working from home alone. I was nervous, so we went looking for a watch dog. We were her third set of people in nine months — the current set were getting rid of her because the mom’s new boyfriend didn’t want a dog.

Husband fell for her immediately. She was shiny and black and pouncing on a giant soccer ball. She had no leash manners. She barked at any dog that walked by her house. She had the worlds softest ears. Ears I wanted to make sheets out of. Ears I should have been combing daily to save the fur, have it spun into yarn and knit into a scarf. For a while, she had separation anxiety. We’d go out and when we’d get home, she would wag her tail so hard she’d fall down. We’d get out of the car and hear this hammering sound on the second story of our house. We finally figured out that it was Katie, sitting on the stairs wagging her tail against the wall. That tail could take out a small child. She would take things of our and walk around the house with them. She wouldn’t chew them up or tear them up, but we’d come home and she’d have a single shoe in her mouth. She’d take an old bra out of the wastebasket. Or a single ear swab.

Eventually she realized we’d always come home. She pulled too hard on the leash, although we took her to puppy school and she knew the rules. She had a thing against German Shepherds, dogs that looked like her, and random other dogs. We didn’t know why she would choose to like or not like another dog. You could take her to the dog park, though, and she’d behave well. It was no-dog’s land. She did develop a bad habit of hitting up strangers for treats, but that’s only because someone offered her one without checking with us first. So to Kate, Dog Park = People With Treats in Their Pants. She would chase pigeons, seagulls, and geese, but not other birds. Squirrels were devil spawn who must die; should they touch our property, she would immediately have to go outside and pee on the grass to reestablish her domain. Cats were either potential playmates or something she didn’t quite understand, depending on their reaction to her. Small dogs confused her, and horses were just really big dogs. All people were put on earth to pet her. If you rang the bell, this fearsome bark would ring out and I’d have to hold her by the collar or leash her to keep her from lunging out the door. Not to attack, but to immediately roll onto her back so you could scratch her belly. It made her a great guard dog.

I learned her barks: what meant a dog in the yard, what meant a cat; how she sounded when a squirrel came by and when a delivery truck was in the drive. And woe betide the FedEx driver who didn’t come equipped with a treat in hand. She’d saunter out into the truck itself and sniff around. Until she got too old to get in and out comfortably, she loved to come in the car with me. She’d sit in the driver seat and wait for me. She’d be really pissed if she couldn’t come with us — to the point that she’d wiggle out the door before it shut and go running around the cul-de-sac until caught and carried unceremoniously to the house. Carrying was the only way to get her to the bath, too. She developed an inordinate fear of naked people, because we’d get naked, grab her and chuck her in the shower with us every other week. At the end, we bathed her much less often. She didn’t like it, wasn’t steady, even on a no-slip mat, and if it wasn’t warm out, she’d be cold because she didn’t have an ounce of fat on her. She’d get this ridiculous look on her face when Husband would pick her up, looking over her shoulder and saying in a whiny voice (with her eyes),  “Not the bath!” But bath meant couch time.

Until the last year or so, she was only allowed on the furniture if she’d been newly bathed and only if there was a blanket on the couch. She didn’t start sleeping on our bed until her arthritis got so bad that she was uncomfortable on the floor and would wake me nightly in her discomfort. I was always a dog at the foot of the bed person, so I let her up on the bed whenever Husband was out of town anyway or I’d sneak her up while he slept and shove her off when the alarm rang.

The girl loved the snow. Nothing was as much fun as chasing snowballs. She ran three times a week for most of her life, stopping only at about 13 when her vet said she should stop. She’d bark impatiently for Husband to hurry up. He’d clip the leash on her and she’d take off, dragging him behind like a cartoon, his feet nearly leaving the ground. The beach was another great place. We’d take her to the Washington coast. If it was foggy, we’d follow her progress by watching for flocks of seagulls rising in a panic.

For 14 years, Katie was my constant companion. I was never in the house alone, but for the very occasional Saturday when the Husband, the Son and the Dog would all go for a walk and I would enjoy this half hour of blissful silence. I didn’t know how oppressive it can be to be all alone in a home with no one to talk to, not even a deaf dog. And I did talk to her. A constant stream of communication, about what I would make her for dinner, about coaxing her to eat a little at lunch to make up for the weight she lost when she had a bad bout of ideopathic vestibular syndrome (think a drunk person with the bed spins only without the fun of the mojitos before). She survived cancer twice. She made two local dogs fall in love with her. She would take on any dog in the area until they acknowledged her the Empress of Rose Hill — then they were great friends.

At her peak, her home territory stretched to a 25×25 block area. It was all hers; the people were all there to pet her, the animals to acknowledge her superiority. Maybe she could have listened better — when we lived across from a cemetery, we’d walk in there and I’d let her wander around and chase one of her dog boyfriends. The only way to get her back was to point at our house and say, “Look! Daddy’s home” and she’d come running. Because she was Husband’s girl. I used to joke that if she had thumbs she’d choke me so she could sleep with him all by herself. They would gaze at each other longingly, communing in a common language called adoration. Husband is probably as bereft as I am. But the thing is, she was with me all the time. I cooked for her. I took her with me on errands. I’d walk her to pick up the Boy at school. She came with me when I trained for two consecutive Three Day Breast Cancer walks. I wasn’t in love with her like Husband. But she was perhaps more a part of me than of him. He might argue, but I feel as if an appendage is gone.

There will be another dog, I know. I can’t work from home without a colleague. In the meantime, I’m helping my son with his Bar Mitzvah project working with Bull’s Eye Pit Bull Rescue, so there are some great foster dogs and adoption events I can attend to pet dogs. I have neighbors with pooches I can play with or take for a walk. But I need one in my life full time. I also know that Katie was that one dog — that best dog I’ll ever have. My next companion will be wonderful in his or her own way. But Kate? She was one of a kind. Rest in peace, DogDog. I only hope that we gave you as much as you gave us.