I wanted to thank you so much for writing this story. We lost our beloved Sparkie (14+)in April 2007 and our hearts are broken. And exaclty one month later we lost our beloved cat Scrathc (19 yrs old). Our beautiful girl Katie was heartbroken and lost with her siblings. Finally in August we adopted a kitten at our vets suggesston for Katie, we werne’t ready for a dog yet. We call our kitten Roxie, but actually she is our healter. She made us laugh again, before that it was so quiet without Sparkie dog here. Then in December we adopted Emmitt, a 1.5 year old cocker spaniel. He is without a doubt the most lovable velcro dog I have ever seen. He is such a love bug and Katie and he play and run and have fun. Katie is 10 years old but acting 3 again, its wonderful. I hated my husband for buying this book, I would just wail while I was reading it. But I finished it yesterday morning and today I put the colage together that I had been planning for Sparkie, so I am not sure how but your story helped and I wanted to thank you for writing it. I am attaching what I wrote when we came back from the vets after letting our poor boy go. I couldn’t even talk about to any of our friends, so I sent out this email. Thanks again for sharing the beautiul story of Sprite and Pepsi. Looking forward to hearing more about your new addition . Thanks again.
Sad News
It is with very heavy hearts that Randy and I help Sparkie cross the Rainbow Bridge this morning about 4:30 am. He had a pretty tough week and yesterday when I came home, he had been sick and was having a lot of trouble walking. We took him to the vet and they ran limited blood work. We talked about it and decided to bring him back home and just spend some time with him rather then him staying at the vets while we waited for the blood test results. The vet called and his immune problem was back, plus something with his red blood cells also. We talked with her asked her some questions and she assured us we would know when he was in trouble or pain, and he did. He was very restless, but still some how managed to get to the kitchen when he heard one of us out there. His friends Paula and Billy came to say goodbye to him and then we spent time with him on the big bed he claimed as his, ok it is our bed. We just hugged him, loved him, and said our good byes as best we could. Then his breathing became increasingly more difficult. So we came downstairs and made the dreaded phone call to the vet. We did make sure he had a fix of the cat food we spent his entire life trying to keep him away from. It was a hard decision but one that it was time to make. Our hearts are broken right now, we where sure he would live forever or at least until his 15th birthday in July. He defied the odds so many times in his life and we thought we would lose him before this. We took many trips to the vet sure, it would be the last one with him. But he gave us lots of extra time with him. I am not sure why I am even sending this right now but I need to do something and I do not think I could call each and every one of you right now, so please accept my apologies for doing it by sending an email. Heck I am not even sure I could even speak on the phone anyway right now, its so hard to say the words out loud.
Even with Katie and Scratch, the house feels so empty Sparkie’s presence was huge, just like the hole in our hearts right now. We were just reminiscing about how bad he was and as I sit here with tears flowing I am looking at his collar with its one tag that says “Bad to the Bone” no truer words were ever spoken about our little blonde dog. He has slowed down a lot in the past months, but that didn’t stop him from still getting into trouble. Just last week since he couldn’t get into trash cans and loved tissues so much he pulled the toilet paper roll (still attached at the wall) out into the hall and laid down and proceed to have his snack. He got very silly in the past years; he liked to bring his stolen treats to where ever we were and have them in front of us.
He will be so missed by us terribly. He died peacefully in my arm at the vets. He had an amazing life and he made us laugh so often, even tonight between the tears. He was truly a unique dog/person (he never knew he was a dog). Thank you all for being there with us on so many almosts.
Tonight was his night to finally run free and without pain. I will miss you furever my beloved boy, run free my beautiful boy. Buffee, Radar, Molly and Lincoln will meet you at the Bridge and guide you, till we meet again.

Ferne from PA