Thanks guys. It was very hard to see him go, but I know it was the right thing to do. I miss him so much.
It makes me smile to think of how loved Trey was even by people that never met him. For a shy dog, he certainly touched a lot of people's hearts. Almost everyone who met him would instantly be drawn to him. I was thinking of a day a few weeks ago where we were at my uncle's place. I was standing there and Trey came up and just looked up at me the way he always did in pure adoration. My uncle commented 'Wow, that's a look of love.' I never understood why when he got old, he decided to follow me like he did. I do know that I've never seen that devoted of a look, that loving of a look in a dog before. I think part of it was his simplicity. He just never thought of more than 'I love my people', really.
For the longest time, we didn't even get along much at all. I think part of it was because we got him after he had changed hands a couple times. He didn't know how to be a dog at first. It took me years of working to where he was happy being petted and held. He never got to where he was happy leaving his house though and he never learned how to play. When he wanted you, he'd just walk up to you and stare and sometimes honk. He never had manners, he'd just shove his nose into your hand and shove the other dogs out of your way.
Josie wanted me to mention that Trey is also responsible for saving lives. It's her story she'd tell everyone when they'd ask about our dogs. Trey ran off an owl that was large enough to carry a papillon away once. It was sitting in our yard and Trey rushed out with his hackles up, barking and growling like mad. Beau was young and obliviously going towards the bird. Trey always sounded huge when he barked and he ran that bird off pretty well. And once long ago when we had hamsters, I left the lid open to their cage accidentally. Juniper, one of the hamsters got down the stairs and Nikki ended up finding her. Nikki was not so gentle with small animals and she went into her EAT mode. Trey ran to my parent's bedroom and woke them up and took them to where Nikki had the hamster cornered behind a dog kennel. Every now and then he'd do something like that, but most the time he was sweet simple old Trey. He was so clumsy too and lacked so much common sense. He'd walk straight into a door quite often. When he was wearing his cone, he'd get hung up on everything and you'd have to come 'rescue' him. I always heard if you put a sheet on a dog's head that the faster they'd take it off, the smarter they were. If you put a sheet on Trey's head, he'd stay there, waiting for rescue forever. I would never even try to pull it off. Oh and it should be mentioned that he hated the vacuum with a passion. It took so much work to keep him from trying to maul the vacuum whenever we brought it out. It must be a sheltie thing, all of my shelties were the same way.
Yesterday was really hard but I know in my heart it was time. I walked to his pen and said his name and he looked up at me and I knew that it was the day. Still, it's never easy. In a way it's hit me even harder than Nik's passing did. I don't know why, probably because they were a pair and now they're both gone. He was really the last pet from my childhood and he's just always been around. He was older than Josie...
I've already found myself looking at sheltie rescues and thinking maybe I don't want to be sheltie-less after all. They've been such a part of my life for so long I can't imagine being without one for a long time. They really are an amazing breed.
