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Dec 1, 1989 - June 20, 2001 Leben passed away suddenly on June 20th, 2001 at 11 1/2 years. old. He just had a nice swim at the beach and a walk back to the house the day before. "Leben" means "life" or "lively" in German. My son, Jacob, wanted to call him Frisky" so I picked a similar word in German. His registered name was "Erleben Frieden" meaning "Live to See Peace" because he was born the year the Berlin Wall was taken down. His favorite activity was playing catching games, especially with fire sparks, water, butterflies, and other flying insects. He will always be my "Butterfly Boy."
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Leben
could barely sit up straight or walk any distance the last year of his
life, but it didn't stop him from getting around and being close to me.
When I went downstairs to work in my studio, he would insist upon coming,
and then try to lay so close to my chair I could hardly move. When
I went upstairs, he would try to follow. I learned to let him go first
so that I could watch him in case he stumbled. One day as he was slowly
climbing, his back legs trembling, he stopped and looked frantically back
at me as if to say , "I don't think I can make another step. Now, what
good am I to you, and what is there to do?" I panicked in pain of
the thought of having to put him to sleep soon, as others had said to me
before. But then I got an idea! "I know, " I said to myself.
"I'll use his back legs like the handles of a wheel barrel and see if that
works." So I held his ankles in my hands and said to him smiling
and with confidence, "Go on , Leben, go on! You can make it!
I gotcha, I gotcha!" He looked back at me, beamed a big smile, then
nodded his head in understanding and galloped up the stairs using all his
might with his front legs. It worked perfectly from then on!
Wherever we were, if he found a step he couldn't make, he would wait for
me to take his back legs and say, "I gotcha, Leben. I gotcha!" In
the winter we learned another trick - to use his big fat tail like a leash
to hold up or steady his back legs so that he could walk through the snow
and ice to go potty. Leben's love for and trust in me and other people
grew immensely in his last year. Oh, what I would give to have just "
Leben
could play all day in the water if you let him. When he got the OK, he
would bolt down the hill like a bullet to the lake - at first, when the
neighbors saw him coming (all 110 pounds of him), they would brace themselves
in fear, wondering where he was heading. But he'd go straight like an arrow
into the water, hit it with a big splash, kick up his front feet, and make
splashes all day, catching the water and swimming like an otter.
He'd jump, spread eagle, right off the dock too. He was a sight to
see!