Along came a girl who stole and broke my heart.  And for all the riches of the world I wouldn’t change any part.

When Erin joined our pack she wasn’t our first foray into seniors, she wasn’t even the oldest member of the pack.  Despite coming to us with only one tooth and a hole in her gums, Erin wasn’t the worst health case we had taken in.  And though Erin couldn’t master going down stairs and sometimes sprawled when going up stairs, she wasn’t our first hound to have problems with stairs.

But when we made the mistake of turning our backs on our unmuzzled pack in the backyard – Erin was the first to earn the title of Pack Fight Victim.  And she was the first to earn the title of Pack Fight Victor.  Even at 12 years old, Erin was a fighter who was determined to make a full recovery.  And that is just what she did!

And yet for all of the things that Erin was and was not, her own indifference was clear.  Not indifference to life or to other pack members, though.  Erin’s indifference was to the concerns of seniority, and to pack behavior, and to every type of pain.  She was beautiful that way.

Some greyhounds will come into your life and affect you like Erin did us.  And I challenge you, dear reader, to find words that can explain it.  How do you express a love for a greyhound that makes you lose all self-control and openly weep with joy just by looking at you?  How do express a gratitude for a girl that teaches you what strength really is?  How do you express your understanding of life because of a greyhound’s death?

You cry.  And you smile.  And you laugh.  And then you cry some more.  And all the while all you can think is “Thank you, Divine One, for giving me even one moment with this precious angel.”

Along came a girl who stole and broke my heart.

And for all the riches of the world I wouldn’t change any part.

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