Mkomazi (outside Tsavo) Elephant herd 1976 from 'The end of the game'.
Inscriptions on Picture.
'Last Word from Paradise' Peter Beard
' The elephant, in the course of time has adopted man into his scheme of things, with deep distrust' Karen Blixen, 'Out of Africa'.
' The ruined wood we used to know won't cry for retribution, the men who have destroyed it will accomplish it's revenge'
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I've been avoiding doing this, cause I'm not the best at sharing, and cause its the suckiest life update ever. Obviously, this is not an art post.
I'm gonna make a short thread of photos out of this, so, hope im doing this part right, but CW: animal death, pet death ahead, in case you dont block those tags already.
Just under 8 years ago, I adopted the best dogo I have ever known. We had ranch dogs when I was a kid, so I've had a LOT of dogs; Tsavo was something super special. I mean, kid leash trained himself an hour after I adopted him. He had zero trouble learning new things, from go.
He was great with our other animals, tho he ate my favorite feather pillow and carried my not yet planted flowers around like a trophy.
And he was tiny tiny when he first came home; I was told he wouldn't get very big (i did not believe them one bit.)
Apparently neither did he. In fact he took it as a challenge. He capped out at 102 pounds at his peak, and healthy. He was a hiker, a camper, and a lake dog (tho he didn't swim well. Imagine, a lab who can't swim??)
He would sit with me when I was gardening, hang out in the garage when we were working, would lay around and watch the chickens...his second name was "In-The-Way", but in a good way.
He even helped fetch tools when we were working (nothing sharp or too heavy, he knew his limits)
He was always patient with us taking photos (of which there were so. Very. Many.)
In spite of my best attempts to socialize him, he never did quite get the whole, personal space & canine body language thing. But luckily he made friends pretty easily.
Which was helpful when we brought home a kitten who decided "slow introduction" was too slow for him.
He was an all season idiot, and made everyone happy with his persistence in fetching items when requested; bags, tools, shoes (matching pairs!)...And if he didn't know the item you were requesting by name, he would bring you every single sock he could find to make up for it.
He helped me come down when I came home in tears from work, when I was stressed from a nightmare, or if i woke up in a panic after an episode if sleep paralysis.
He was, inequivically, the absolute best dogs I've ever known, and could have asked for.
Now the sad part. I posted recently on Twitter that Tsavo hasn't been doing great. He developed a limp in late October. I took him to work for a checkup.
We thought it was a torn mcl, that would heal. It might not even need surgery, since his xrays weren't showing much.
We were wrong. It was cancer. And by the time we realized it, it had already spread from his leg into his chest.
I was not mentally prepared for how fast everything went downhill from there, but given the tone of this post, and the censor, I suppose its obvious where this goes.
He stopped eating. He couldn't get comfortable, even with pain meds. His leg seemed dead and cold below the knee, and he started coughing only days after we got the results back.
We opted to euthanize Tsavo last Thursday, the 1st of the month.
I am very very not ok right now.
I'll get another dog. I know I will, I've proven in the past I dont like not having one around. I love dogs. I'm going to meet one this weekend. I feel selfish being excited when I'm still this broken, but this last month has been a nightmare in itself, so I want to be happy too.
But I firmly believe getting a new pet is never a replacement for an old one. And it couldn't be anyways. There will never be another Tsavo like my great, amazing boy was.
I can never be grateful enough for what this big, stupid, idiot goofball brought to my life.
And im just as grateful for my friends, who have been helping me deal with this for over a month now.
I love this dog, with my whole heart and everything I have, and I will miss him forever.
He really was the bestest best boy ❤
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