VA Dog Rescue: The ghost of Gypsy past

Monday, May 24, 2021

The ghost of Gypsy past

Clay and I were sitting in the office Saturday afternoon, talking after he had come home from work. I noticed a dog tag laying on the floor near his foot and asked him to pick it up. We often find stray tags around the house or around the yard, particularly from dogs who play hard with others. Sometimes the ring just gets caught on something and they pull off. The tag found by Clay's foot this day was unusual, however, because it was from Gypsy.

Gypsy, Queen of the Universe, Queen Bitch. She's been gone for about 10 years now, which makes finding a tag with her name on it laying in the middle of the room a bit of a mystery.

I've been blessed with many dogs who share some or most or Gypsy's devotion to me. Maya, certainly, and more recently Della, and most recently the two foster girls, Callie and Lucky. Sometimes it feels like too much of a good thing. It's always tough for me to leave home and I've been fretting a lot lately about what to do with Lucky when we go away this Wednesday.

If you want to take this as a sign from the great beyond, there's still a question about what it means. Gypsy always thought I needed a different hobby. She really didn't approve of all these foster dogs and she definitely didn't approve of female dogs who might try to come between her and me. But Gypsy was devoted to me and supported me even if she thought what I was doing was crazy. Gypsy always had my back.

Gypsy

After finding Gypsy's tag on the floor on Saturday, I wrote the "Some dogs" blog post which was a thinly veiled plea for help dealing with Lucky during our absence. Help arrived the next day when friends/neighbors/travel companions/former adopters offered to give it a try. I took Lucky down the street to meet them and their dogs. I think she may well like it better there than here. She will be anxious at first, but she will be safe and we won't lose the progress we've made over the last couple of weeks around here.