Recently, my childhood dog passed away. He was a 14-year-old German Shepherd named Bear who had been with my family for as long as I can remember. I don’t know how to write something that will capture him fully, because that would be impossible, so here’s a few funny memories I have of him.

When we first got Bear, he was chaotic. Anyone who has a German Shepherd will know how crazy they are from 1-4 years old. Because he was so crazy, we couldn’t keep him inside the house, so he was mostly an outside dog. But he wasn’t a great outside dog. Bear would chew through the wire fence we had that enclosed the back yard and run around the neighborhood. He and another dog would roam the neighborhood and terrorize the ducks from the neighbor’s pond. Everyone in the neighborhood knew who he was because of the trail of ducks he and the other dog left. Because of this, Bear later became an inside dog.

Since Bear was now an inside dog, that meant we had to take him on walks around the neighborhood (when I was a small child). By that time, bear was probably around 70-80 pounds of muscle, so he would be the one walking us. As I was taking him on his daily walks, he saw a neighbor’s cat in front of us and darted toward it. With me still holding onto the leash. I was yanked forward and dragged until I released the leash and let Bear go. I realized that even though I was in a lot of pain, I still had to chase after Bear to take him home before he got to the cat.

Once Bear got older, he became more tame and calm. While I was in high school, I took him on walks around the new neighborhood (I was no longer a small child) during the summer. Being a German Shepherd, Bear had A LOT of fur which made summers way too hot. Being a little naïve, I continued to walk bear in the dead of summer. After walking a block, Bear always found a puddle of water from the rain the night before and lay down in it to cool off. Cars would pass us and laugh while Bear enjoyed the cool puddle. It was funny until we got home and his feet and belly were covered in mud/dirt.

Losing a childhood pet is and will always be the hardest thing anyone will have to do. You know it’s inevitable, but you don’t realize that the time is almost up until it is. The only thing you can do is remember the good times you had with them. I’ll always be grateful for the time I had with Bear and I know that no other pet will ever compare to him.