The Life of Gizmo

The Best Dog Ever!

14 years ago my son Matt and I went to a local pet shop looking for a Siamese cat. They didn't have one so we browsed all of the animals on display. There was the strangest looking little thing in one of the cages. It looked just like the Mogwai named Gizmo in the movie Gremlins. I even stupidly asked what it was (not meaning breed of dog, but what kind of animal was it). The guy told me it was a Pekingese/Shi Tzu mix, which clued me in that it was a canine. Doh!

I have never felt my heart drop like that. It was love at first sight. He took him out of the cage and this little critter started kissing me. My heart was doing flip flops. He made me feel like the most important person in the world - until I found out he kissed everyone. I saw it was a male and I swore if I ever got a dog it would be a female, but there are no rules when you're in love. He was mine.

We brought him home and he turned this cat lady into a dog lover. I grew up with dogs but I always preferred cats. That was until Gizmo came into my life. I was converted. Every day I would tell him, "You were made for me." As the years went on I didn't say it as much, but I never wavered in my affection.

He liked Elle's pacifier

Everyone that met him loved him, and he loved them back. He was the sweetest dog I've ever met besides one of the dogs I grew up with, a black cocker spaniel named Inky. Inky was in the house before I was, so I don't remember him very well. Gizmo was just such a cutie pie. And that was one of his only faults, he was so cute I just wanted to hold him and cuddle him. But he was not a lap dog. He'd sit for a few seconds and squirm and get uncomfortable. I'd try to get him to sleep close to me but he would scoot down to the end of the bed.

Gizmo wasn't your average dog

Gizmo went blind this year, in 2011, and was pretty deaf. He always had a voracious appetite and had stopped eating. Towards the end he had bad diarrhea and we'd have to give him a bath every time he went because he would fall in it or it would just go down his legs. He always wobbled when he walked but no one suggested surgery was ever needed, but those back legs weren't holding him up well in his final days. He'd even fall in his urine.

It was time to take him out of his misery. My last words to him, which I could barely speak, were "You were made for me." Jimmy had his hands on him during the injection. I couldn't look and was crying like a baby. We took him home and Jimmy buried him in the backyard behind the pond along with his favorite toy and some Milkbones, his favorite treat.

Daddy's boy

We are looking for another dog, not to replace Gizmo, but to help a shelter dog. Good bye my little boy, you were definitely one of the loves of my life and I don't think we'll be lucky enough to find another like you.