On Easter Sunday 1996, my Dad and I arrived home after mass to find a dog sitting on the front steps to the house. My Mom and Barb had arrived home before us and had also seen this lost dog. The dog had a collar, but no tags. He was clean, seemed well fed, and extremely happy to see us. There was no sign of an owner, and none of us recognized the pooch.
I was a sophomore in high school. It had been about five years since our dog Patches died and we had been a cat family with Dickens ever since. Now, Dickens was a wonderful pet and companion, but I had been desperately wanting another dog for quite sometime. Upon discovering this Easter visitor on our doorstep, my mind began racing that our family would again become and dog and cat family. Probably reading what was going on in my mind, or perhaps just being reasonable and not wanting to let a strange dog in the house, my parents decided to tie the dog to the garage door ( to prevent him from wandering into traffic) and place a call to Animal Care & Control. Tyler, as I very quickly named him, had other ideas. He repeatedly chewed through the rope and would make his back up the front steps. Perhaps sealing the deal as far as I was concerned, I said I would walk him around the block while we waited for ACC to come. As I rounded the corner to head back to the house, the van rolled down the street. When the very nice man tried to put Tyler into the cage in the van, Tyler made like a cat being put in the tub. I couldn't take it. My eyes teared and I went inside. While I headed in, my sister leaned to my Mom and whispered, "You know we're getting this dog."
And we did. Very quickly the Australian Shepherd mix we named Tyler became a Galvin. Dad and I went to pick him up. We had to go down to ACC to get him. The had us meet him in one of their "Get to know you" rooms. Tyler acted like he was our long lost dog, recognizing us immediately. I rode in back with him on the way home, him standing on my lap with his head out the window, me holding on tight, partly out of fear he might jump out the window and partly because it felt good. The first week was interesting. We were dog sitting Bo, a little toy dog that thought he was a lot tougher and also believed that the Galvin house was his territory. And of course there was Dickens. And in comes Tyler. A bigger dog than we had owned before, topping out at 30 lbs. when he came home (It seems funny to call him big now knowing Davis, Barney, Cali, Finn and Jake), Tyler set about making his mark. He chewed off the dusters on the living room couches, humped pillows and desperately sought out Dickens and Bo.
Soon, though, everything settled down. Tyler would chase cats out of the back yard and quickly come running in for some rub downs. He could always be found curled up on of the beds at night and we quickly learned about the pervasiveness of white dog hair. Especially from a shepherd breed. But that was the sole low point. Tyler loved going to the dog park. We were biased toward Mountain Lake Park. He would usually say a quick hello to the dogs at the park and then set about his business, chasing his Kong on a rope. He would bark wildly as he chased it through the air, nearly losing his mind when it would bounce over his head.
Almost ten years ago, after my Dad moved to Virginia, Tyler followed along. It is no secret that bringing him to the East Coast was one of the hardest things I have ever done, but knowing that my Dad would be taking better than wonderful care of him made it easier. Tyler soon discovered the joy of a big back yard (seriously, you all from San Francisco have no idea) full of squirrels and a street with plenty of kids. Tyler and my Dad remained practically inseparable.
Tyler was put to sleep today. I always believed that he picked my family for a reason. I was not at the happiest point in my life when he showed up. He very quickly took care of that. And then he brought a little bit steadiness with him to help my Dad adjust back to life as an East Coaster. We all loved Tyler. He was happy until the very end and brought a smile to anyone he met.
