It’s been a couple years but I’m ready finally. Cheese was the the worst dog I ever had and I’ve never loved someone more. We met when I was hitchhiking through California. Someone pushed her out of a car at me and I grabbed her. She was confused as I was about it but we hung out. I was camping that night so brought her with me. She was whining and pulling and finally got loose, so i figured she had some where to go. A few minutes later, there she was, laying at the foot of my bed. When she was still there the next morning, I named her cheesecake and we went to the local shelter to check for microchip or any missing dog report and there was no records so she was mine and I was hers. For almost 8 years we were together after. She could escape anything. And as soon as she felt bored she would, any time of the day. Cheese would stay MIA for a couple days at a time, she drove me crazy and I would shake my fist at her as I would attempt to catch her. Days later she would always arrive (though fat, happy and caked in mud), I’d welcome her in with open arms and a bath. I’ll never know what she was up to haha but we were kindred spirits for adventure. Every day hikes in the red woods were our favorite thing and every night we played on the beach. I taught her how to swim, it always blew my mind that an adult lab somehow was never taught before me but when she figured it out, she loved it. During some of those years though, I went through some serious trauma and cheese was there for it all. I talked to her, hugged her and told her everything that i couldn’t tell anyone else and she stayed and listened to it all when no one else could hear. Her and I moved back to Colorado on our own and we spent our first summer back all over the Poudre canyon. Every morning was coffee and a sunrise hike. About a year later, cheese suddenly fell ill, baffling vets until it was discovered she had an aggressive cancer eating through the roof of her mouth and I would have probably have a month left with her and thats on antibiotics and pain killers. Anything after that was pushing the chance that it would hit her artery and she would die. I packed up the car and we went to California to the beach we spent our first night together and we said goodbye. A week later back home we said bye.
Today I still cry for her, she’s the best friend I ever had and she changed my life.
