Penny

About three and a half years ago, every other Sunday the gardener would come and work on our front and back yard of our home.  My sister Mary would get up early Sunday morning to unlock the side gate so the gardener could work on the back yard and put a leash on our tri-color beagle named Penny.  Penny was a wonderer so Mary wanted to make sure she didn’t wonder off. 

One Sunday morning I was sleeping comfortably in my warm bed; it was about six thirty that Sunday morning when I woke up to Penny howling at my bedroom window.  “Not now Penny!” I grumbled as I turned over and covered my head with my blankets.  However, Penny did not put an end to her howling and seemed to howl ever louder.  Feeling frustrated because it was too early and I still had a couple of hours of sleep before I had to get up and get ready to go Sunday’s liturgy at our parish.  I got out of bed and opened my window, looked out and there was Penny standing at full attention and howling her little lungs out.  “What is girl? Is it a possum? Do you see a possum?” I asked.  Penny was from the hound dog family so she had the tendency to bark at possums, squirrels, cats or rats.  As I looked out the window trying to see what she was barking at, her howling just got louder and she started to snarl at me as she howled so I knew something was up. I put on my slippers and ran outside in my pajamas to investigate.  I thought I would be running into a possum since our neighbors had fruit trees and were not in the habit of trimming them.   When we would get critters running along the top of our back fence I would scare them off with the water hose.   As I made it to the sliding glass door to our back yard I had seen what Penny was barking at.  It was my sister Mary; she had fallen and was lying face down on the grass of our back yard.  Her walker was upside down as it lied a few feet away from her.  “Dad! Mary fell!  I need help!” I yelled.  I ran outside to help my sister, Penny seen me and ran right up to Mary, sat down and continued to howl.  “Mary! Mary!  Where are you hurt? What happened?” I carefully turned her face to one the side so she could breath easier.   “I don’t know, I lost my balance and fell down trying to put the leash on Penny,” said Mary.  She started to cry and said, “I was so scared, I thought that no one was going to help me.”  “Penny helped you Mary, she howled at my window until I came out side to see what was going on.  Penny helped you.”  By this time Penny stopped howling and just sat next to Mary waging her tail.  My dad came out a few minutes later and together we helped Mary off the ground and onto her walker.  “Does anything hurt Mamas?” I asked.  As tears ran down my sister’s face, she answered “No, no.  I just got scared and I don’t know why I fell down.”  Mary had a cut on her face from the fall but it had stopped bleeding.  “Mamas, we have to get you in the house so I can clean you up and you can try to relax because you are going to be fine, okay?”  “Okay” trembled my sister.  So my dad and I pushed her back into the house while Mary sat on her walker.  Penny just followed behind and kept an eye on Mary.  This was the beginning of many falls that Mary had unbeknownst to any of us that the MS was starting to become more aggressive.  I am so grateful for our Penny; if it wasn’t for her Mary could have suffered serious injuries from her fall.   Penny was 17 years, 7 months and fifteen day when we had to put her down.  She was suffering from tumors that bloated her tummy and was in a lot of pain,  she had a fever and she had very shortness of breath.  It hurt so much to see Penny suffering and sometimes in life you have to make tuff decisions, putting Penny down was a  very tuff decision.  I remember talking to Mary about Penny, I told Mary that Penny had gotten very sick and passed away. As I explained to Mary what had happened to Penny, we both cried together and were filled with sadness on that day.  Now, I would like to think that Penny when to Doggie Heaven and is now running around keeping Mary company.  Thank you Penny for taking care of my sister here at home and keeping her company in heaven.