Skinner Girl.

It’s been one of those weeks. I’ve had quite the emotional roller coaster. I’ll tell you about the rest of it another time, but this post is just to tell you about a good friend of mine that we lost this week. I’m just going to be me and not pretend to be tough about it.

This week, about a month shy of her 15th birthday, my dog Skinner passed away. It was a really hard week. Skinner was old for a poodle and blind and deaf, but she was still a really happy dog. She was a great friend for so many years. I think I’ll tell you her story.

2 days after my 10th birthday, our dog Fritzy had a litter of puppies. She chewed up all the wires under the T.V, which really impressed my dad. After sufficiently chewing up all the wires she had her puppies under the T.V. stand. Skinner was born on March 3rd. Her name wasn’t skinner yet because my little sister in all of her five-year-old wisdom and creativity decided her name would be pebbles. We gave away the other puppies, but decided to keep pebbles on the condition that we could change her name. Roxy agreed; Just happy to keep her puppy. One of the special things about our new puppy was her habit of getting car sick. Once she even puked on my head. Nice. I know. So we decided to name her after our cousins who also got car sick. The Skinners. And so she became Skinner. Born a little black puppy, we were all surprised when, after her first haircut she came home gray. That’s how she stayed.

When I was 12, we moved to 100 Mile House. Skinner happily accepted her new house and bigger yard. As a younger dog Skinner could jump higher than any dog I had ever seen. She seemed to have springs built into her feet. She was fast too. One of my favorite things was how she would jump into a snowbank and disappear, only to spring out of it like a kangaroo. She loved having her tummy rubbed! I would always pretend to shoot her with my hand so she would roll over. I would pretend I taught her to play dead, but really she just wanted a belly rub.

When I was in grade 12, my dad got suckered by a pair of brown eyes, some soft fur and the promise of a shed-less puppy. He brought home a new little pup to play with skinner so she wouldn’t be lonely after losing her mom. That’s when we got Gracie. Gracie with gorgeous brown eyes, soft fur and more shedding than…well anything. Skinner taught Gracie all of the important things she needed to know. Things like chasing squirrels, knowing who in the family she could mooch off of, and how to open the cupboard door and tear apart garbage with flair.

As she got to be a senior citizen dog, Skinner would get more and more bold mooching off of my mom. As if to say “I’m old, just hand over the meat.” She slowly got cataracts and went blind and finally deaf. and yet she would still wander casually over to the kitchen, open the garbage and pull it all out. Just like a 2 year old under a blanket, she assumed that if she couldn’t see you, you couldn’t see her. I think she just realized that being told to go lay down after being bad was ok. Thats what she was planning to go and do anyways.

I will miss my skinner girl. She was such a great dog. She had this sense that would send her straight to you if you needed a cuddle to make everything ok. She made this funny clicking noise when she was sniffing for things that would always make you laugh. She was a mom, a friend, and she kept secrets really well. The stories of Skinner’s adventures could be long and lengthy. I think I’ll just want to keep remembering her in little bits to cheer my self up. She was a really great dog and I’ll miss her lots.

Me and Rox with Skinner and Gracie. Christmas a couple years ago.