We'll never know how the first part of her life started or how she ended up on our farm and in our family, but we know how life went for her once she showed up and made her way into our hearts.
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| Neta holding her in the vet's office on her first day with us. |
There could not have been a happier dog as she grew into her new life with us on the farm. There were many days in the first few years where you would look out into the yards and fields and see her running one direction or another, full speed, tail, ears and tongue flopping. She was the picture of joy. Sometimes she was tail up, nose to the ground on the trail of things following her instincts - we are next door to a quail farm. She would come into the house, completely exhausted, flopping onto the cool, wood floor. Sometimes clean, sometimes covered in whatever would stick to her fur from the woods and tall grass and sometimes just completely wet, muddy and filthy. But always worn out and happy.
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| A filthy, muddy Lulu, at her happiest |
As those days slowly faded into her older years, she still enjoyed a run from time to time, following Neta up and down the lane, to and from Hollis House when it had to be cleaned for arriving guests.
In the last year she was (sort of) diagnosed with Canine Cognitive Disorder (basically Alzheimer's for Dogs), along with advancing cataracts and diminished hearing, she wasn't quite the same youthful dog as the one who ran with reckless abandon. She got more quiet and slept more, enjoying the cool of the house to the heat of the outdoors. She still loved to be loved on, and like when we first met her would push against you, head down until she flopped down into a fully submissive, belly-up posture for you to rub and scratch her anywhere you could reach.
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| She loved the cool air that came down the stairway. |
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| Our last picture of her from mid-June. Enjoying the comfort of the sofa. |
I won't go into all of the sad details about her condition other than to say that her life wasn't the same for her or for us as it was when she was younger and healthier. We knew the end was not far off and we dreaded the decision we'd eventually have to make; we wanted to head off any suffering that medication couldn't alleviate. When she took a sudden turn for the worse a few nights ago we knew it was time.
So we said goodbye to our loving and faithful companion. May she run in fields and woods and swim in ponds and roll in the grass in whatever waits for her beyond this life. We hope that the life we gave her lived up to the life she obviously deserved for all the love she gave back to us.
Goodbye Lulu Belle. We love you!
More blog posts about Lulu -
The day we found her - http://thehaganfarm.blogspot.com/2016/08/butwe-said-we-werent-getting-another-one.html
Her figuring out and accepting the family dynamic - http://thehaganfarm.blogspot.com/2016/09/lulu-belle-one-month-and-counting.html
Farm Dogs - http://thehaganfarm.blogspot.com/2017/01/farm-dogs.html
You Dirty Dog! - http://thehaganfarm.blogspot.com/2018/04/you-dirty-dog.html
