This is Lucy. I found Lucy early one morning running down the middle of the road. Her head was high with determination. She was so determined that she was going somewhere that she didn't even move when a car approached her from behind. It had to swerve to keep from hitting her, but she never broke stride. I pulled over and called out to the little dog, who immediately run up to me and climbed into my lap. Right then she had my heart.

This little dog was a mess. She was cold and wet (it was a fall morning) and her hair was all matted and full of burrs. One eye was matted shut with pus filled hair.

My husband had been following me and he stopped to see what I had found. "What kind is it?" he asked. "Shih Tzu" I replied, recognizing the chrysanthemum face and small stocky build. I new this information would help my already planned plot to keep her, as my husband loves the breed.

"What do you plan to do with it?" he inquired. "First thing I'm doing is taking her home for a bath and a hair cut!" He frowned at me, knowing I had already claimed the dog as mine. "We can't keep it", he growled, "You better call the county to come and get her". I snarled at him and carried my sweet little bundle to my car.

Once in the car Lucy made herself at home in the back seat, using the armrest to lift her little body just enough to peer over the bottom edge of the window. "She rides well" I thought. Occasionally she would peek her head between the bucket seats to check on me. Her pouty lower lip turned up at me and her copper colored eyes peering inquisitively but cautiously into mine.

When I got her home, I hurriedly rushed her past our pound-found beagle terrier mix "Scruffy" and our resident Shih Tzu "Chewy". She stared down at them from my arms, but made no movement or noise.

She held perfectly still while clipped away the mats and bathed her three times with flea shampoo before getting all the fleas off of her. My tub was black with them, and poor Lucy looked bald due to her hair being so thin from malnutrition. I cleaned around her eye the best I could after repeatedly soaking the area with a warm, damp cloth to loosen the pussy mess.

After a quick dry with a blow dryer, it was off to town to show my husband how sweet she was. Unfortunately he stood his ground. "We already have two dogs..You don't know if she's diseased...What if someone lost her and they're looking for her?" The last comment got to me, as I remember the sleepless night I lay tossing and turning when Chewy had gotten scared while visiting with friends and had run away. We had to go home without him that night and I didn't sleep a wink. So I agreed to go back to the area where I had picked her up and look for her home.

Well, after knocking on a lot of doors I finally found a child who recognized the "dog with the matted eye" and he pointed to the house where she had come from. It was a rather nice looking newer two story stone house in a not too old housing additional along a lake. I thought surely I would be these peoples hero for returning their lost pet.

When I knocked on the door, an older child answered. "I believe I have found your dog!" I announced. "What dog?" He asked. " A little brown Shih Tzu" I replied. He immediately left the doorway and exited through another door leading to the garage. Within moments he returned and said "Yeah, it's Lucy". There was no excitement or joy in his voice. It was almost as if I had asked him if the ball I had found on my living room floor, after crashing through the plate glass window, were his.

At about that moment a man descended the stairs " Can I help you?" he snarled. I had heard his wife and he arguing upstairs about which one of them was going to come down and see who was at the door. "Yes, I believe I have found your dog. A neighbor boy recognized her as yours" I stated hesitantly. At this point I really just wanted to excuse myself and hurry to my car. This man was obviously annoyed that I had come to their home. "I didn't know she was missing". With that, he too exited through the door leading to the garage to return a moment later and state "Yeah, it's Lucy".

I lead the man to my car to retrieve the little ragamuffin dog, explaining as we went that she was in awful shape and I hoped he didn't mind that I had bathed and clipped her. As I handled the sweet bundle to him, he grabbed her with one hand by the scruff of the neck, holding her down by his knee like a six-pack and stated "It don't matter, we're putting it to sleep anyway. With that he opened an access door to the garage and tossed the dog.

"Um, excuse me, but my husband and I will take her"

"What?" he snapped.

"I said my husband and I will take her". After arguing that his wife had paid "good money" for the dog, and finally speaking to the wife, I was able to retrieve the unwanted "it" and take her home with me. Once my husband heard her story, he was angry with the people and said "No they're not!" when told that they had planned to put her to sleep.

After a trip to the vet, it was believed that Lucy was fairly healthy, though undernourished. She had an awful food aggression initially, though never toward me, only toward my husband and the other two dogs. Before long she had gotten over it, learning that she could indeed rely on getting two meals a day.

We were able to enjoy this little dog with the big heart for just a little over a year. Then one day I came home to find her at the back door, struggling to breath. Her mucosa were pale, her tongue stuck out, her mouth was wide in a struggle to get air in and out. After making numerous frantic phone calls, we found a veterinarian who was available on Saturday and we rushed her there. The entire ride, Lucy stared up at me from the next seat as she struggled to breath. I pleaded with her to hold on.

The vet arrived just behind me and we rushed Lucy inside. A quick exam and the vet looked at me concernedly "this dog's sick!" "I know " I replied, tears again welling in my eyes.

The vet rushed Lucy into the back of the office and I stood there in the empty exam room, not able to move. I didn't think I was allowed to go back with her, so I asked if the vet needed anything else, and she excused me, advising she would call if Lucy made it.

I cried all the way to my husband's place of employment, where I buried my face in his shoulder and prayed for my "Rucy Raggy" as I had knick-named her. But we got the call I had expected. Lucy had a pneumothorax, a collapsed lung. The other lung was full of prior scar tissue to the point of being ineffective, and Lucy had suffocated to death. My husband and I both sobbed openly. We loved that little dog with the pouty lip.

I often torture myself with the thought that perhaps if I had stayed with Lucy she would have continued her struggle and been able to be intubated and thus would have survived. There is really know way to know, but what I do know is that that little dog made a very big hole in my heart. For having known her for such a short time she wrapped us around her little soul and to this day I cannot pass the spot in the road where I had first held her without a tear welling in my eye. I also know that I would stop in a second if I saw another little dog running for freedom, and I would give it the same love and affection as we gave Lucy, even knowing that we would once again face the pain of saying goodbye.

The love that little dog gave us will never be forgotten. Lucy - we still love you.

Shih-Tzu Rescue Resources

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