A Dog For All Ages

Oz is a dog for all ages, in three ways.
First, she is amazingly able to adjust to different ages of people. We ran into an old woman in a wheelchair yesterday; Oz approached her slowly and licked one hand, gently. We ran into a young mom with a baby; Oz snuffled the toes and backed away. But when Oz runs into energetic kids—pow!

Second, as I was reminded yesterday, Oz changes ages. It was a surprisingly warm and golden day, so we headed to the lake. I tried to sneak some sticks into the poop bag in case Oz wanted to fetch them—but Oz caught me. She wanted to fetch so badly that we ended up running to the lake, not walking, and rather than waiting to fetch, we played tug of war as we ran down the street. Cars would slow as they saw us. Sometimes she had the stick in her jaws. Sometimes I had it in my hand. Most of the time, we were tugging as we ran, both of us growling.

When we got to the lake, she was a puppy, eager to run into the lake, snuffle, and flop. She rolled on her back, her front, her snout, and anything else she could find, making sure she could get some sand scent and scratchin' on her, all the while going "Nraaa. Graaa!"

Walking home, she was a normal adult dog.

That night, as we watched TV, she was a clingy senior dog. A dog for all ages.
And of course, the third way she's a dog for all ages is that she deserves to be immortalized.

Greg