It is with the greatest of sadness and with the heaviest of hearts that we have had to say goodbye to our beloved Tay (the big black bear) – sacked from his first job as a guide dog because he was too free spirited, oh and scared of lorry air-brakes, he was resigned to a life of luxury and relaxation.
If he deliberately failed his training so as to pursue such a chosen lifestyle he would have been devastated to learn on his arrival from the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association, that we had already paid our deposit for a teeny tiny Andrex puppy before we adopted him. His super-cute little sister Treacle would arrive on the scene very shortly putting paid to his cunning plan. Then to add insult to injury when she did arrive she promptly took over the garden, his toys, and his bed and constantly teased him on a daily basis from that point on.
He was however smart, too smart some would say, strong, extremely gentle, completely chilled and crept around the house like a stealthy panther. He enjoyed life, tolerated Treacle pushing him around and would often race to her rescue should she be barking at something he hadn’t already seen and dismissed as harmless – he did like to chase squirrels and cats though and even the odd rabbit on the moors had him racing off into the distance.
Slowing down later in life he morphed from the stealthy panther to the cuddly big black bear changing from a silent unseen assassin into a noisy plodding old man. The onset of cancer didn’t seem to faze him too much either but soon after that he developed canine degenerative myelopathy and we knew the end was not too far away. This was a more difficult time for us than for Tay as we saw the slow decay and loss of control whereas he simply wanted to go for walks, eat, drink and sleep – dog’s life eh!
Having pets is all about providing them quality of life and without going into detail regarding the inevitable end we had to take the most difficult of decisions and have him put to sleep on 7th April. We’re missing him so much already and have cried a swimming pool each but it was the right thing to do for him. He gave us so much love and happiness and we owed it to him not to let him suffer.
He will be forever in our fondest memories.
Annette Howarth
Tay was a lovely well natured dog. In his latter years when I got home from work he’d come for a cuddle while I had a coffee before we went for a walk. He was my big black bear, so very gentle but oh so strong when he needed to be especially when he famously dragged me down the train platform on my stomach when he thought his Dad had left him. Oh how we laughed as did everyone on the opposite platform!
We will miss him dearly but we have so many happy memories to treasure, people say he was lucky to have us as his parents but we feel the lucky ones to have had such a wonderful amazing dog in our lives for so long. RIP Tay, forever in our hearts. (07.04.20)
Anonymous
So sad, but Tay left a wealth of memories behind and in time you will be able to share them with tears of laughter. Jx
Carl Chamberlain
As you know Stevie and Nettie we had to do the same for our Meg last October. It’s the first time I have had to do it and damn was it a hard thing to go through, thinking about her now I can remember the last photograph I took of her and she looked so tired and fed up.
Anyway, you can both take great pleasure and pride more than anything that you gave Tay the best life anyone could have given him, I don’t know many people who will provide the dogs with a sofa of their own!! Keep your chins up….as in both of you not anybody putting on weight haha. Carlos 👍👍