Race name: Oshkosh Dewey
Born: May 13, 1999
Passed: May 27, 2009
Adopter: Ramona Grove

In Their Silence

It’s hard sometimes to let go.

Hard to know when enough is enough.

Hard to stop holding onto the hope that a miracle will come in time to save you.

But miracles don’t happen, time runs out and the race to save your life comes to an end.

In your youth, you were full of life with 99 races under your collar.

13 wins, 17 second place, 15 third place and 2 stakes races.

YOU WERE A WINNER, but then I always knew that about you.

When asked what your fastest time was, I’d replied “The time it took you to race into my heart”.

I loved everything about you Dewey.

You were a kind and gentle boy; you loved people and you loved your stuffies.

You were built like a stretch limo with a big head and the “trademark - Oshkosh Nose”.

You had a plethora of names, all terms of endearment; “Dew”, “Dew Man” “Dew Da”, “Do Do Head”, “Goofess McDuffess” and the occasional “Dewey Dam it” which was interchangeable with “Dam it Dewey”.

You loved Meet and Greets, you just HAD to go.

After all, “Who would be Rockys “Wing Man” if you weren’t there”?

“Who would help him draw in the crowds”?

“Lean on them”?

“Bow for them when they gave money”?

No one but you, of this you were sure.

Yes, you had your ways of persuasion, bouncing all four off the floor as if to say.

“Pick me mom, pick me!” “Me, back here, pick me!”

You always won, I always picked you.

After all, you were my shadow, my “ Dew Da”, how could I possibly leave you behind?

It was the look that got you what you wanted, “The Face” I called you. Those brown eyes, that big nose and those two little vampire teeth that stuck out in front, oh yes, you were going…you could win over anyone with that face.

I will miss so many things about you Dewey.

I will miss how you waited patiently for me to come home with a stuffie in your mouth.

I will miss how you would take that same stuffie outside to “pee” then bring it back in and put them to bed.

And at those times when the others took their toy out and left them in the rain, I could always count on you to come running in the house with it leaving a trail of water behind.

As you aged, the years began to take their toll. Slowly at first with the gradual weight loss, then it began to fall off with the speed of a racer shooting out of the starting box and before I knew it, you were gone.

Walking into the house for the first time after your death was hard, the silence was deafening.

In a room full of hounds, not a sound was uttered, not a movement made.

They knew…they knew you would not be back.

They knew, for they had stood in silence as your life slipped from my arms.

They stood vigil, watching through the night as I held you, and in the end, wept for my loss.

And in their silence, they mourned their loss of you.

“Who will be our Wing Man now”?