by Daven Zavala
First off, my name is Daven Zavala, I am a happy, lucky 15 year old girl and am currently in my sophomore year of high school. The year 2000 has been a good one but most definitely a year I will never forget. On April 10th our beloved family dog Chelsea gracefully and wilingly passed on into God's gentle hands. Eventhough there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that Chelsea is the happiest she has ever been and is watching over us every second of every minute of every day that passes, letting her go has without a doubt been one of the single most difficult and devistating thing my family and I has ever endured. Our Chelsea was with us for 16 joyful years, and my family has not known life without her until now. We all had dreaded the day that we all knew was bound to come, but low and behold it came. It came out of the blue, but it didn't surprise us, as we knew she was old and year by year it became more and more evident. It became harder for her to hear certain things, but luckily she wasn't completely deaf and her eyesight at her age was surprisingly impecable. Her appetite was normal, as it had always been, she hardly ever turned anything down from the table, and whenever she did, we ALL knew something had to be terribly wrong! One morning, however, Chelsea had suddenly woke up and my parents knew something wasn't right at all. She was panting hard, wouldn't walk, wouldn't drink anything and looked as if she was staring into space. So, my mom called the vet and was told to bring her in to see if there was anything they could do. They had suspected that maybe she had had a heart attack or a maybe even a stroke. That morning my brother and I woke up to go to school and as I was coming down the stairs, my dad had told me something was wrong with Chelsea and we neeeded to leave early so my mom could bring her into the vet. Completely and utterly worried about my beautiful Chelsea, I insisted on going to the vet with my mom and with tears streaming down my 12 year old brother's face, he insisted on coming along too. We finally arrived at the vets and the doctor Chelsea had been to to see all of her life said she would run some tests to see what had happened and if there was anything she could do. She seemed to be optimistic about Chelsea and told us that she thought she had a good chance of recovering. To say the least, we all had felt a little better about the whole situation. We went back that afternoon and the vet said she had a disk problem in her back but fortunately she had some medication for Chelsea that we were all hoping would work out. Driving back I had tears pouring down my face thanking God and St. Francis that they had given our baby a second chance, because I truly thought she would be alright. For the next two days my mom and I tried our very hardest to get her to eat and drink and take her pills properly but we had no such luck. She would walk around aimlessly in the house as if she had no clue where she was or where exactly she was going. Needless to say, it broke our hearts to have to see what it appeared to be our once joyful and sweet Chelsea walk around and look at us as with her hollow, sad eyes. It was as if she were trying to tell us that she was in fact suffering and it was time for her to become an angel in God's kingdom we always knew she would become one day. So one day while my brother my dad and I went to the mall, my mom decided that a part of her that we had loved so much was dead and Chelsea wasn't Chelsea anymore and it was time to hand her over to God who so graceously blessed us with her in the first place. We all came home and everyone had unanimously agreed that we didn't want to see her suffer anymore and that the following morning we would have the awful task of putting our brown eyed baby Chelsea to sleep. After all the love, attention, and help in raising my brother and me she had given to my mom, she thought she owned it to Chelsea to cradle her in her arms while she took her last breath. As the vet placed the turnicut on Chelsea, my mom told me she didn't flinch once, that she was as calm as ever and had looked up at my mom and she knew that Chelsea was ok with passing on and that she would be alright. The vet injected her and my mom had said that Chelsea didn't even move once, that she had to look up at the vet and ask her if she had passed on. She looked down with tears in her eyes and said that she did in fact pass away. I was so proud of my mom for having done that, as I did not have the courage to see my Chelsea be put to sleep, I figured it was just too much for me to bear and it wasn't how I wanted my final memories of her to be. When my mom walked through the door I ran to her and we all were sobbing, hugging and hurting so much. The next few days were the hardest yet, the first I had had without Chelsea. We would all question if we had done the right thing, had we have given her just a little more time, would she have pulled through? But now we all realize that what we had done had without a doubt been the most rewarding and the most precious gift we could have ever given our Chelsea.She had filled our lives with such love and such joy that we all knew we owed it to her to hand her back to God where she could eternally watch down over us. She went with such dignity and beauty that just through that we know she was ready to go and God was ready to take her. Not a day goes by that I don't miss her to pieces and occasionally my eyes will water and a few tears will stream down, but I can't help but to look back and just smile. My life has been so beautiful with her and a day hasn't gone by where I haven't thanked God for letting all of us have her for 16 wonderful years.