Zoe

Zoe

Nov. 5, 1997 – Aug. 29, 2013

She was our Zoe. Her name is Greek for “life,” which I chose to embrace the adventure that was to come. But soon after I brought my 10-week-old puppy home, it became clear I had little inkling of what I had gotten myself into.

As an energetic and growing Lab, she became a master of opening any cabinet/oven/dryer/refrigerator doors she could reach in the kitchen of the house I rented in La Crosse, Wis., during the hours she spent alone while I was at work. But opening the refrigerator soon became her specialty, and she was quite talented at raiding it, one day removing almost all of its contents and eating quite a bit of it. After I found bungee cords long enough to wrap around the fridge to keep it closed, she had to find new hobbies, but for years after that, she was willing to take advantage of any lagging oversight on my part, and later Dave’s, to help herself to a tasty snack.

She took her first swim in the backwaters of the Mississippi at age 4 months when she suddenly jumped off La Crosse’s “Rabbit Trail” during a walk. Her love of swimming continued when we moved to Duluth when she was 2 years old, and when we would get in the car and start toward the Wisconsin Point beach, her nose would go up in the air as soon as she could smell Lake Superior and she would whine until we arrived. She loved chasing Frisbees and balls, and she would swim to retrieve sticks from the icy waters of the big lake to the point of exhaustion and numbness.

We went from the rented house in La Crosse to a bachelorette apartment in West Duluth — where she had to conquer her fear of stairs to join me on the second floor — to the blended family household in Lester Park with Dave, Lauren and Mary. Her best days were with family gathered around, just hanging out and enjoying each other’s company.

Her worst days were holidays, departures from the routine, and Halloween was truly a nightmare, with strange children coming to the door in odd get-ups, ringing the doorbell and making demands of her masters.

She waited each day until the positioning of the sun told her it was nearing 3 p.m., time for our daily walk through Lester Park, along Amity Creek and ending with a splash in its shallow waters.

She love, love, loved to eat. Chicken, turkey, tuna, green beans, green peppers, spinach, carrots, sweet potatoes, bread! She knew all the hiding places for treats at the vet’s office, positioning herself in front of the drawer and giving anyone in the room a knowing stare until they gave her what she wanted. She kept a sharp eye out for any styrofoam containers of leftover chicken fettucine when relatives came to town and ate at Grandma’s Restaurant. More than once she helped herself to those leftovers in the middle of the night.

Over these past 15 and a half years, she made us laugh, she tried our patience, and she opened our hearts.

And then she broke my heart yesterday, when we said our final goodbyes.

Zoe was a good dog, our good buddy, and we are going to miss you like crazy.